


Dust

by MasterSkorpius



Category: Steven Universe (Cartoon)
Genre: Gen, Science Fiction
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-01
Updated: 2018-01-23
Packaged: 2019-02-09 06:38:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 28,363
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12882246
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MasterSkorpius/pseuds/MasterSkorpius
Summary: Fire Agate's life is dull. The gem colony that she is overseeing is slowly falling apart, destroyed by the dying planet's rage. Is there even the smallest hope of a good life for Agate? (originally posted on fanfiction.net)





	1. Stagnation

1\. Stagnation

Year 7102, Day 36.

Old lamps flickered on in an empty facility. Dim light illuminated the orange dust covering pretty much every surface, no one cleaned it up in years. There was no need to do that, after all, this mess wasn't really a problem. And even if the lone inhabitant of this outpost had time to do it, the planet would quickly reclaim lost territory and send its dusty breath through every crack in old walls.

The main base of the gem mining colony was slowly falling into disarray. Every day there was a new little crack, new scratch, new dent. Despite all the effort that went into building this facility, there would soon be nothing left beside a pile of rubble. Not that anybody would notice. Everyone who cared already left, been shattered or were just gone. Cleaning and fixing damaged buildings was not the responsibility of ones that had stayed.

A light-orange skinned hand touched panel of the main console in the control room. The computer started with silent hum and slight delay. It took more and more time for it to turn on lately. But there was nothing to really do about it. Caring about electronics was outside of her responsibilities and her skill field. She wasn't a peridot after all.

A bright, holographic screen and control panel were the last things to turn on. Four-colored symbol of the Diamond Authority appeared in a burst of light on both just to fade into white a few moments later. In its place, there was a set of complicated icons and a list of automatically sent reports from different sectors of the planet fiddling aimlessly across the screen. There were no warnings. She technically didn't need to read any of those as long as there were no warnings.

With quiet boop, the communication program popped up on the left side of the screen. It took some time to load interface and then some more to download messages from the main server. Everything was old and extremely slow but that wasn't unexpected in the slightest.

There were messages from only one outpost, two of them by the looks of it and both from this morning. They were sent by Peridot who was administering one of the countless mining facilities. The last living Peridot on the planet. And one of two last sentient creatures abandoned on this ruined rock.

MO-0274: Hello my Agate.

MO-0274: How are you feeling today?

It wasn't a conversation that would normally happen between Agate and her subordinate. But as last two gems on the planet, they could ignore formalities. They still followed last orders though. They didn't really know what else to do.

ColonyCC: Good.

ColonyCC: Computer still getting slower. Same for server connection.

ColonyCC: How is your situation, Peridot?

There was a long moment of silence and Agate decided to stand up and look through the window. The control room had a view of the main area of the base with a warehouse on the left and hangar on the right side. Free space between them was covered in heaps of russet sand.

Far on the horizon, there was a little speck of one of the mining facilities. The sky behind it was still dark and covered in stars. It was also littered with remains of one of the planet's moons - completely destroyed in process of extracting resources. Good thing that all those rocks didn't fall to the planet's surface. Instead, they formed a neat ring around the globe.

The computer made a quiet sound. A few lines of characteristic letters appeared on the screen. The mining colony administrator moved away from the window and again stood in front of the holographic console. With two fingers, she stretched communication app window a bit. It took few moments for graphics and symbols to adjust the resolution.

MO-0274: Nothing unusual happened.

MO-0274: Nothing really changed since yesterday.

MO-0274: Except for sand.

MO-0274: There is more sand.

MO-0274: A lot more actually.

MO-0274: It got into reactor cooling system and triggered the alarm.

MO-0274: Again.

MO-0274: I managed to clean it up before sending a status report.

MO-0274: And before anything bad happened.

MO-0274: Also, I have similar problems with facility's computer and server connection.

MO-0274: I will check antenna today.

MO-0274: If there is some kind of problem, I will try to solve it and prepare a repair manual.

MO-0274: I am positive that problem is sand-related.

Agate smiled slightly, she never had any problem with the sand or dust that was laying all over the place since all of the planet's vegetation disappeared all those years ago. It hadn't bothered her even when it had begun to cover the console after a wild sandstorm had breached the facility and sent a never ending torrent of sand and dust into the place that had from then on made the surfaces of everything you could touch gritty with the stuff. But this particular peridot couldn't stand it, sand irritated her like nothing else in this world.

ColonyCC: Good luck with repairs.

ColonyCC: I'm leaving the computer turned on.

ColonyCC: It's time to start the daily inspection.

She hesitated for a moment and her hands paused over the console before she typed one last message and walked away from the computer.

ColonyCC: Have a nice day Peridot.

With humming machine behind her, she marched through the corridor that led to the stairs which would bring her to the lower floor. This section of the base was bigger than command centre. Its ceiling was higher - as if two floors were connected. This place served as a canteen where facility's security force members spend their free time between training and doing whatever they were ordered to do. It was empty and quiet these times. The last jasper had been gone for more than fifty years now.

From the canteen, the facility extended into two wings. The left one contained rarely used living quarters and on the right side, the infirmary and warp pad could be found. Spinning on her heel, Agate shifted her echoing steps and ducked down the elongated wing to the right.

The infirmary was probably the last room that was hermetic and cut off from the rest of the dying structure. It's doors opened with quiet noise and revealed a nearly empty space. The white walls glared back at her as most of the equipment used for repairing gems were gone. It had been taken when the colony formally got shut down after the last bits of resources got mined out.

One of the last pieces of equipment - a special kind of incubator used for speeding up reforming process after gem's physical form's destruction - was in use right now. In it, under the pulsating light, sat small triangular gem. She took a small breath and her hand ran over the surface of the pod in a familiar way as if she had done so for years. It was one of the defective peridots. It wasn't clear how she got hurt, but Agate found her like that after investigating the lack of communication with her outpost. Over one hundred years have passed since then. There wasn't even a shadow of a chance that the little technician will ever come back. It turned out that being really hyperactive and overly creative weren't only flaws of this peridot.

The next section of facility's right wing was a lot less… depressing. It was a quite large room with a round, crystal pedestal on the floor. Warp pad - technology allowing gems to travel enormous distances in a blink of an eye. She could just step on it and nearly instantly teleport to any outpost on the entire planet. It gave her the ability to visit Peridot from mining outpost number zero-two-seven-four. But… there wasn't need for that. This action would be unjustified and technically against orders. She couldn't do it. The Agate paused and the air around her seemed to pause with her, like a quiet breath as if it could hear her thoughts.

Or… could she? After all, she was the highest in command right now.

She shook her head. No. She would scare Peridot... She would scare her and distract her from her important tasks. Agate took a step back and looked at warp pad one last time and gave a slight sneer. Who would think that loneliness could do such things to one's mind? Breaking orders! What's next? Stealing equipment? Treachery?

She walked out of the room and went towards passage that was leading outside of the main building and into the hangar. It was the biggest structure in the complex. Carved in the mountainside, it could easily fit four medium sized military ships. In fact, one of these was still here. Broken and useless, but still present.

Agate completely ignored the ship as she walked past it. She had seen enough of it when her curiosity pushed her to explore the old, rusty thing. There had been nothing truly interesting in there for a gem like her.

She walked down the stairs that were leading from a catwalk to the main floor of the hangar. There were tonnes of scrap and many different parts of different machines scattered all around the area. The quickest way around this mess was a narrow path between piles of junk.

All those things were collected here by workers and technicians that had been left on the planet after closing down the colony. They used them to repair different systems around the main facility and in the outposts. Agate never understood why they preferred to keep all this junk here instead of inside of the warehouse. It prevented ships from landing inside and therefore made hangar useless.

Suddenly she stopped, her steps pausing as she turned back to look back at the rusted hangar.

Maybe… Maybe that's what they wanted? Did they want to prevent the landing of any ship? Maybe they tried to stop Homeworld's forces from coming back? But that would mean… That would mean that…

No.

Agate shook her head firmly, her subordinates couldn't be traitors. She knew every single one of them and was sure that they were loyal to the last moment of their existence… Loyal to a fault despite everything.

Agate nervously wiped off speckles of dust from her uniform and turned back in direction of the ship. What was happening with her today? Where were all those thoughts coming from? Maybe she needed to calm down and examine herself. It had been a long time since she had gotten herself this worked up.

Walking by the side of the ship, she found herself in front of the gate that lead to the main area of the base. It was over two times higher than her, reaching nearly to the roof of the hangar. The size of this construction allowed pretty much any cargo to be transported through it. The gate instantly reacted when the palm of light orange skinned hand patted symbol of the Diamond Authority engraved in its middle. The symbol lit up in a quiet white glow and the triangular door shuttered open, letting in a gust of wind. Some more russet dust gathered on the floor at her feet as she stared out into the open area.

It was like a desert in miniature. Countless little dunes were moved around by the wind, big heaps of sand gathered by the walls. Nothing was still, everything was constantly changing. Probably even scratches left by security personnel's training sessions were gone by now. Scraped away by the rough breath of this forsaken world.

She made her way through sand and dust, leaving behind deep footprints. The gate leading into warehouse was exactly identical to the hangar one. Well… In projects at least. After years and years of use and being exposed to severe weather conditions, it stopped glowing and sometimes had problems with opening up completely. Although this time it wasn't that bad - the opening was wide enough to fit a regular sized jasper.

The warehouse was pretty empty. The main fleet took most of the weapons and tools, some of the rest broke over time. Peridots were really mad about it because maintenance work without specialised tools was pretty much impossible. Or at least really hard - judging by how technicians still managed to pull off most of the conservation works.

Security forces, on the other hand, didn't complain at all. They just collected the remaining weapons and took care of them. Blades were always sharp and shiny, laser cannons always ready to shoot at anything that would require shooting at. Not that anything on this planet could harm gems. Everything starved to death after the vegetation died. An obvious weakness of organic organisms.

Agate walked slowly through the middle of the spacious room, passing lone weapon rack on her way. Stored on it were swords made for big soldier gems like jaspers or amethysts. One of them had been abandoned on the other side of the room. Only a part of the hilt was sticking out of the sand. She didn't even look at it. She didn't want to look at it. Simply being in this part of the facility was causing a wave of bad memories to flood her mind.

She blinked few times to stop the tears and took a deep breath, letting the hot, dry air flow through her speech module. Doing that, despite being completely pointless, always managed to calm her down a little. Sometimes she wondered why it worked. Gems don't need to breathe after all. Why would they even know to do that?

The thought was cut short - there was no time to ponder the nature of gems right now. She needed to finish the daily inspection, go back to the control centre and check on the colony. Peridot probably already found the cause of the slow connection and flooded the communication server with reports, messages and instructions. All this information will make for a pretty nice reading.

But first things first. There still were some places that Agate needed to visit to fulfil her daily responsibilities and next on the list was the reactor chamber. It was probably the only place in the entire facility that wasn't stripped of machines and tools when the Homeworld forces left. After all, without the working reactor, this place would disappear from the face of this planet in few years.

All this complicated machinery was hidden on the side of the warehouse, behind heavy gate made from pretty much indestructible alloy. It was heatproof, explosion-proof, corrosion-proof and it was just as thick as an Agate's arm length. It was also designed to automatically close in case of reactor breakdown, locking all explosive mess inside.

Inspection rules did not require her to go inside of vault-like reactor chamber. Specifically for such occasions, there were cameras installed inside. Agate touched a panel positioned on the wall beside the gate and instantly a holographic screen appeared. It was divided into four parts, each showing perspective of one camera. She glanced at the holoscreen and almost immediately turned it off. The reactor chamber was empty and that was everything that she needed to know.

Fortunately, the way back to the command centre was short - there was a staircase leading back to the living quarters. She went that way, briefly checking empty rooms and getting some more sand on her boots. One of the lights on the corridor's ceiling was blinking. Its light source must've broken in some way shape or form. Too bad that facility ran out of replacements.

Some light sources probably could be salvaged from abandoned outposts, but that was technically against the orders and colony rules. This fact effectively tied Agate's hands in this matter. Fortunately, it wasn't that much of an issue - outside of inspections, she rarely visited this part of the facility.

Inspections were always emotionally draining and it felt nice to finally get back to the command centre. It felt safe there. It felt like everything in the entire colony was under her control and that was very comfortable and natural for an agate. Even the silent hum coming from the computer was oddly calming. Although, that last thing probably didn't come with her faulty programming but was rather acquired through the years of repeating the same actions over and over.

Abandoning the thought, Agate looked at the holoscreen. It displayed a series of new messages from Peridot.

MO-0274: I just finished checking the energy supply of the antenna.

MO-0274: And wiring.

MO-0274: And I looked at the antenna.

MO-0274: From afar, because I don't really trust the external catwalk.

MO-0274: I will need to check it properly, eventually.

MO-0274: Anyway, I have several hypotheses about what is causing connection problems.

MO-0274: But I'm pretty sure it's the sand's fault.

MO-0274: All those cloddy sandstorms.

MO-0274: Why this planet have to destroy everything with sand?

She asked herself very similar question more often than she wanted to admit.

* * *

**There we go - my first fanfiction written in English. I'll try to post a new chapter every friday.**

**Big thanks to Mellium for beta reading this story.**

**~MS**


	2. A Work of Art

2\. A Work of Art

Year 7102, Day 37

The morning ing started like any other - with dim lights and sand cracking under her boots. Sandy dunes, visible from the window of the command centre, moved slightly since yesterday. There was also a small sandstorm, barely noticeable, far on the horizon. In other words: nothing special.

Not like something special ever happened in this place. Well… as long as bad things aren't recognised as special. Because this planet had seen a lot of bad things.

For a moment Agate pressed her forehead against thick glass of the window. It was surprisingly warm. Probably because of the immense heat coming from the local star. Back in the day, when the colony was brand new, the surface was protected by the atmosphere and was a lot less hot. That didn't last long, though. By the time she crawled out of a hole in one of the kindergartens, the air was pretty much as thin as it was now.

She sighed and stepped back. There was no point in remembering the world as it was before she was created. Remembering wouldn't force it to stop its revenge. Remembering wouldn't bring back the shattered.

Getting back to her morning routine, Agate turned on the computer. Quiet humming instantly filled the command centre, somehow making the wait more bearable. It still was kind of irritating, but thankfully ended after few moments when the holoscreen and holographic console appeared glowing weakly.

She winced when the list of auto-send reports appeared on the screen. There was a blinking red symbol next to a record that was pinned on the top of the window. An orange finger poked the blinking light - a full report from kindergarten KG-SE2-005 popped out and took most of the space on holoscreen.

"No connection" was written in big text on the top of the document. The rest of it wasn't really that important. There could be few different causes of this problem. From the destruction of the antenna to power supply failure. And all of them required investigation.

Agate sighed once again and massaged the bridge of her nose with her the tips of her fingers. A day out in the desert wasn't the best way to spend one's time. Orders are orders though and orders exist to be followed.

She would've gone out already, but the communication app suddenly came to life. Messages from Peridot flooded her inbox.

MO-0274: My Agate!

MO-0274: I need to report something unusual!

MO-0274: There is this a big plume of smoke visible from my location.

MO-0274: Judging by its size and position it must be coming from one of the kindergartens.

\- "There we go…" - Agate said to herself.

MO-0274: It might be a critical reactor failure.

MO-0274: How today's reports look?

MO-0274: Any problems with kindergartens in this area?

She looked at emergency report once again to refresh her memory. Then she started typing.

ColonyCC: Actually yes.

ColonyCC: We lost connection with kindergarten KG-SE2-005.

ColonyCC: I was just preparing to go there.

Suddenly she had an idea. But… Was that ok? She didn't recall any rule stating otherwise. And, in this situation, an assistance of a technician would be pretty much necessary. How else would she be able to assess the damage to the facility?

ColonyCC: Do you want to assist me during the investigation?

'Why do I even ask if she wants to?' she thought, a bit angry at herself, 'She's my subordinate, isn't she?'

ColonyCC: Meet me at KG-SE2-005's warp pad if you would like to go.

With that, she left the computer and walked out of the command centre, walking straight to the warp pad room. On her way, she examined every room and corridor. That way, she wouldn't have to check this area later during the daily inspection.

After entering the warp pad room, she stood above warp pad's crystal surface. It was covered with russet sand. Agate took some time to sweep it away and then climbed onto the warp pad once it was clean. She imagined her target and soon a blinding light surrounded her.

For a few moments, the gravitation disappeared. It didn't affect travelling gem, though. Changes of gravity never affected gems because their bodies automatically compensated for it. She sometimes wondered what would happen if a non-light based creature travelled via warp pad.

Then the light died down and she felt solid ground under her feet. She was in the middle of a desert, surrounded by sandy dunes. Over her head, there was only an expanse of a permanently orange sky. In front of her, the way to the kindergarten SE2-005, partially hidden under piles of dust and dark smoke coming from the facility itself. Oh… And there was Peridot. Sitting on a metal panel that she probably brought with herself, her back was facing the warp pad. She was looking at some data displayed on a holo-tablet hovering in front of her.

It took a moment before she realised that someone was standing behind her. After this realisation, she immediately jumped up and stood at attention, folding her hands into the diamond salute.

\- "My Agate" - she said, trying to sound official. It was hard to take her seriously though, with her light-yellow hair done into a little, uneven ponytail on the top of her head.

She was a bit shorter than Agate. Her uniform was a regular peridot uniform with a symbol of the Yellow Diamond on her chest and with the addition of a yellow-tinted goggles placed over her forehead. Her gemstone was placed slightly above her collarbone and was in a shape of a triangle with rounded corners.

\- "At ease" - Agate smiled slightly - "Hi Peridot. Shall we go and check on this mess?"

Peridot nodded nervously and followed her commander who started walking towards kindergarten. As soon as her feet touched the sand, she winced in disgust.

The path to the facility, just like pretty much everything in this colony, was made of cheap metal. After a short walk, the path changed into stairs that were entirely covered with sand. The green technician nearly fell down after missing a step but managed to regain balance. Barely.

Kindergarten was carved in the stone, thirty units below planet's surface and was composed of five alleys. Each over one thousand units long and something around ten units wide. In its walls, thousands of gem-shaped holes could be found. Every single one of them once had a gem inside.

But now they were full of sand. Everything was full of sand. When Agate and Peridot entered one of the alleys, their feet started to sink into it. It was really difficult to walk like that - it took unexpectedly long time to even get close to the facility's main building.

\- "So… How was your morning, Peridot?" - Agate asked, looking at her companion who tried her best to not trip on the sand.

\- "It wasn't much more difficult than usual" - she answered after sending her commander a slightly nervous look - "I managed to clean up a little. There was sand everywhere again. After that, I started planning the repairs and then I noticed the smoke."

\- "Oh? And how far have you planned already?" - the orange gem folded her hands behind her back and sent a nice smile towards Peridot.

\- "I decided to start with checking the power supply and the terminal outside. Then I will…" - she fell silent and perplexed look came over her face - "My Agate, may I speak freely?"

\- "Of course you can" - she was never one for a formal talk from her subordinates anyways.

\- "Why you don't act like other agates?" - the technician asked after a moment of thinking - "When I was in a team with other defective peridots, our commander and other agates screamed at us constantly, harshly disciplining us when we did something wrong or too slow…" - this was surprising to Agate, never in last few thousand years Peridot told her about her past. And now she didn't really know what to do with the sad gem - "Why you are not like them? Why are you letting me talk to you? Why you are not disgusted with me?" - the green gem's eyes were rimmed red from unshed tears and her voice was strained with unfamiliar emotion.

\- "Do you know why I was left here?" - Agate calmly asked. The green technician shook her head - "Because I'm just like you."

\- "But, my Agate…"

\- "Too kind for an agate" - she cut her off - "I have no innate capacity to be an effective supervisor of any facility. Defective."

\- "Oh… I'm sorry…"

\- "You don't need to be" - she smiled at her companion - "We are lucky we didn't get shattered right after emerging from our kindergartens."

Peridot had nothing to say after that. Her thoughts were in complete chaos. And all this sand around her wasn't helping. Good thing, that there were only about one hundred units separating them from the kindergarten's command centre.

The building was inside the wall of the kindergarten and only a few parts were visible from outside: a big window constructed from three square glass panels and an entrance. A plume of black smoke was escaping through a vent placed above the window.

\- "Still burning..." - Agate assessed.

\- "The reactor won't go out on its own" - Peridot spoke - "And unfortunately we don't have the equipment to deal with that."

\- "Standard fire extinguisher won't suffice?" - the taller gem asked. She frowned and started walking towards the entrance.

\- "Nope. Not a chance. Fuel needs to be cooled down and then quarantined" - the technician responded.

Agate nodded and stopped in front of the door. It had a shape of a hexagon and should open to the sides. Should. The persisting lack of power within the facility prevented that from happening. Somewhere close to the door should be an emergency lever, but she had no idea where it was.

\- "Peridot?"

\- "Yes, my Agate?" - in a moment's notice, the green gem was at her side.

\- "There should be an emergency opening mechanism, right?" - the technician nodded - "Could you find it and open the door?"

\- "Of course, my Agate!" - Peridot briskly spoke before frowning lightly to herself. The emergency switch was hidden under the sand.

Willing or not, she started to dig, wincing at the feeling of sand running between her fingers. She nearly retreated to her gem when a pair of orange hands dug into the sand right beside her. She wanted to say something, but the look and smile that Agate gave her successfully silenced her.

The two quickly dealt with the sand. Under it, there was a small switch, all scratched up by the dust storms. Peridot grabbed it when she saw it. Pulling it caused the door to unlock and open a little with a metallic sound of the hidden machinery.

After opening the door all the way, now with sheer force, they entered the facility. Inside, there was a corridor with a small stairway on the left and an elevator at the end. The stairway was leading into observatory room which was filled with smoke, judging by all the fumes coming out of it. There wasn't anything of interest there so gems ignored the left route and headed straight towards the end of the corridor.

The elevator was stuck on the ground floor, just like Homeworld's forces had left it. The lack of electricity prevented it from being used like it should be, but Peridot quickly found a solution to this problem. She located a control panel on a wall right beside the elevator's door. It was a flat touchscreen that normally would show few icons and a small logo of the Diamond Authority. Now it was covered with a thin layer of dust.

The technician opened it up without any problems. The screen hung on a bunch of colourful wires, exposing a little metal cage with more wires; some fuses, and switches inside. With her fingers pulsating with energy and functioning like technologically advanced tools, she started to make some room. More and more of the circuits were pulled outside and arranged into a pile on the sand-covered floor. Finally, she reached far inside of the wall and something clicked.

Peridot smiled with satisfaction as the elevator slowly started to descend.

\- "Emergency protocols" - she spoke, with a beaming grin.

The elevator shaft was so dark that without glow from Agate's gem, it was impossible to see its walls. It was built in hexagonal form and without the elevator, the only way down was by the ladder.

The air was cloyed with thick plumes of smoke that only made being there that much more undesirable.

Unfortunately, inspection required checking the underground level. With rather unhappy expressions, the pair started to climb down. Smoke wasn't even that much of an issue - they didn't need to breathe and their gems were giving enough light to see through the fumes. But it still was irritating. Really, really irritating.

Climbing down the ladder took them few moments, but that wasn't the end of this little journey. They couldn't reach the lower level by the ladder because of the elevator standing in the way.

They needed to open the hatch on the top of the elevator, and then open elevator's door from inside. Unscrewing four screws was enough to open the hatch, but getting out of the elevator required dismantling a pretty big piece of wall. Peridot managed to do that rather fast. Agate's help was limited to getting metal plates and pieces of other materials out of the way.

On the other side, there was a big room; dark and filled with smoke. Their gems were barely able to give enough light, but they could see the reactor placed on the wall. It was big, oval-shaped and had a lot of tentacle-looking pipes coming out of it before they disappeared into the wall. The reactor had a gaping hole in its side. Black fumes of thick smoke poured out of it, looking more and more ominous with every moment. Some shards of the reactor's crystal casing were embedded into the surrounding walls and the floor directly in front of it.

Peridot crawled through the hole that they created and started to look around. She could already see that there was nothing they could do. It would take some very specialised tools to just clean up all this mess.

But maybe there would be something to do in this place? The technician walked around for some time, looking at the floor. Finally, she squeaked with delight and ran to the centre of the room. She found a special mechanism, hidden in the floor. It would normally have an extendable console, but that function was obviously out of order right now. And it wasn't like it was really needed, not for Peridot anyways.

\- "You found something?" - Agate asked, approaching her companion while her eyes roamed around curiously. She had been in kindergarten a few times before, but not in this particular one.

\- "Yes!" - Peridot was so excited that she forgot about formalities - "Look! I always wanted to do this, but I was never allowed to!" - she exclaimed joyfully and raised her hands in the air.

For a moment nothing was happening. Only Peridot's expression was getting more and more focused. But suddenly there was loud, screeching sound of something heavy moving against something made of metal. Slowly, a pair of big hands emerged from holes in the floor. They had green crystal casings that distinctly reminded of a peridot.

Mechanical hands flew up and froze in the same exact position as Peridot's. She moved her fingers and flying hands made the same motion. A wide smile appeared on the technician's tired features.

\- "This is amazing..." - she spoke in a hushed tone.

\- "Nice" - Agate wanted to pat her on the head, but changed her mind after realising how difficult this was for the green technician - "What can we do with it?"

\- "Not a lot. I could probably smash the reactor, not that that would make any difference in our situation" - she answered - "Normally those things are multifunctional tools. Kindergarteners use them to manage the samples.. whoops..." - her voice died down for a moment because she lost her focus and nearly dropped one of the hands - I can try and open some sample boxes. They should be accessible without electricity.

She did as she said, one of the hands curled into a fist and extended its index finger. It slowly floated towards the wall and gently pressed it. A section of the wall opened upwards and revealed a long shelf. On it, there was only one thing left - a small, round, metal container. Peridot gently picked it up with her giant hand.

But her movements were slower than before. Much, much slower.

\- "Oh no..." - whispered Peridot, her face darker than usual as her teeth tightly clenched together.

\- "What?" - Agate quickly looked away from the hand and focused on the technician.

She got her answer almost instantly when the hands fell down on the floor with a loud noise. The green casing cracked in few places and the grey container disappeared, probably crushed. Peridot also fell. Her knees hit the floor and she started panting heavily.

\- "Are you okay?" - the orange gem asked, squatting beside her subordinate.

\- "I feel like a pile of sand after a sandstorm" - she answered quietly, her voice clearly laden with exhaustion.

Agate helped her to her feet and then turned towards broken hands, wanting to check on the weird container. She didn't even manage to make one step before something rose up from the wreckage. It was a yellow, round shaped gem that was glowing like a star. Slowly, a slim figure started to form around it.

But surprised expressions of the gems quickly shifted into fear as the figure became horribly distorted. It's arms split up into several different limbs, it's head opened up like those colourful, floral things that were living on this planet before the mining operations begun. Short spikes grew from its body. Only its legs stayed relatively normal and even then they were horribly twisted in an unnatural way that surely caused pain.

Finally, it fully formed and ungracefully hit the floor. Its skin was yellow wits slightly darker spots. She could see a mouth full of sharp teeth. The horrifying, misshapen creature with sad, wailing voice, come awkwardly crawling towards the light from Agate's gem.

\- "What is that?" - Peridot uttered, her voice shaking.

\- "I have no idea" - the second gem muttered, her feet shifting back as she slowly retreated to the elevator shaft.

\- "Maybe we will find something in the database?" - the technician proposed - "I would just extract the right disc..."

\- "I don't know if I want to stay here that long" - the orange gem interrupted her. She was already inside the elevator - "Come on! Run!"

Peridot looked at the terrifying monstrosity of a gem that was approaching her slowly and clumsily, before quickly dashing past her commander. She jumping through the elevator's emergency hatch without hesitation.

Both gems hurried up the ladder and through the corridor. The view of deserted kindergarten has never been so relieving.

But that wasn't enough - the gem monster didn't leave them alone yet. It apparently had gotten used to its body enough because now it was crawling through the corridor at a much-accelerated rate.

Agate took a step back, burying her foot in the sand. She made sure that her subordinate was behind her. Holding her arm out in front, her gem glowed briefly before an irregularly shaped, orange shield appeared in a flash of light.

\- "Any ideas?" - she asked tersely, keeping an eye on the creature. Despite being a part of security forces back when the colony was still operating normally, she didn't have a lot of combat experience. This diamond forsaken planet didn't even try to fight back.

\- "I-I... I can zap it!" - Peridot rushed, her voice cracking as she peeked out from behind her.

\- "What?"

\- "I mean... Shoot it with electricity!" - she explained, showing her hand. Some electrical discharges danced between her fingers - "It might destroy its physical form, but I have only enough energy for one shot."

Agate couldn't help but wonder why someone decided to design technicians so capable of harming others for too long. The beast was closing in and it was angry. Or sad. It was hard to tell.

Whatever emotions it was feeling, if any at all, it didn't hesitate to throw its limbs towards the orange gem. Agate hid behind her shield which took the blow. Her shield glowed a bright orange, absorbed the energy and then released it right back at the attacker.

The burst of energy pushed the monster back and confused it a bit. It gave Agate a moment to think about a strategy.

\- "Peridot!" - she cried out - "I'll distract it! You try to get close and shock it!"

The technician didn't say a word and after few moments of hesitation, she rushed at the monster.

That hadn't been one of her best ideas.

Maybe if she started to run immediately, she would've been able to land an attack. But she was far too late - the gem monstrosity already shook off the confusion and was ready to strike. And what is a better target than a green gem running blindly towards the attacker?

A bunch of long, misshapen limbs shot towards Peridot, grabbing her legs and throwing her on the sand. They started to drag her into giant flower-mouth.

It probably wouldn't end well if Agate didn't step in. She jumped onto limbs that held the technician and punched them with her shield. A big cloud of sand flew into the air, surrounding the orange gem completely. The monster's limbs let go.

Peridot was free.

But the beast was still alive and aggressive. The green gem climbed to her feet and circled the giant body as quickly as she could. Finding its backside was surprisingly easy. But the view was kind of disturbing.

A pair of unnaturally twisted legs was still there, but now they were wrapped by a mass of limbs. It looked like some kind of a dress or at least a loincloth. Last glimpses of consciousness urged the horribly disfigured gem to cover itself, hide from the sight of others.

Peridot took a deep breath. Hot, dry air was carrying some sand particles and breathing it in wasn't a pleasant experience, but she needed it. Just to clear her head before finally doing something useful.

She once again jumped towards the monster. Electric discharges once again danced between her fingers. But this time, the beast wasn't able to catch her. Electricity formed into a small ball of lightning and blasted the monster into a white cloud. Its gem fell on the sand.

An orange hand picked it up and brought it to an equally orange face. Agate looked at the gemstone for few moments before bubbling it. She didn't really care about what will happen to it, so she just threw it into the facilities corridor.

\- "Everything okay?" - she asked, turning to Peridot.

\- "I... I'm sorry..." - the technician said, her voice a bit sleepy - "I messed up. I could've destroyed it's physical form earlier but I allowed myself to be captured..."

\- "What are you talking about? You did great!" - Agate exclaimed - "You took down a gem monster! Whatever that thing was..." - she looked back at the orange bubble levitating in the darkness of the corridor.

\- "Thank..." - Peridot slumped on the sand and yawned - "...you, my Agate..." - the last syllables of her statement were barely audible as she slowly drifted off to sleep.

Agate was quite surprised. Gems falling asleep wasn't a very common sight. Especially a gem that is constantly in motion. She was usually fixing something with her tool-like fingers.

Maybe it's because peridots are technicians and fighting is just unnatural and thus much more exhausting for them.

Or it's just because this particular peridot is defective...

She sighed and gently scooped up the sleeping gem. The green technician was light and seemed fragile.

It was time to finally get back to the command centre.

* * *

**I kinda forgot to post it on friday...**

**I hope you liked this chapter. Please, leave some feedback.**

**And again - big thanks to Mellium for beta reading this story.**

**~MS**


	3. A Crack

3\. A Crack

Year 7102, Day 38.

Light of the day crept into the command centre, lightening up all dark corners. The temperature of the thin air quickly started to rise, changing every flat surface into a frying pan. Good thing that the atmosphere of the planet was still there, as devastated as it was. Without it, this sandy nightmare would probably change into a slaggy, glassy nightmare.

But even in the current situation, the temperature was giving the computer some hard time. The humming was getting louder and louder to the point that it stopped being nice and calming and started to be irritating.

It was pretty much a daily occurrence and Agate was used to it by now.

Loneliness seemed to be her companion these days. Something that she had unwittingly become awfully familiar with.

Peridot left yesterday, shortly after waking up which was right before nightfall. She was visibly uncomfortable being outside of her designated base for a longer time than it was necessary, especially around her superior who was so unusually positive towards her. Most of the peridots preferred solitary and all of this must have been too much.

Also, if the technician stayed, it would be really awkward for Agate who hadn't had much in the way of a company after all these years. And it would probably break some rules.

Still - being alone again, even after such a short break, was really awful. It sucked all the energy out of the orange gem, making her distracted and reminding her of the old days. The days when she wasn't sitting alone in this crumbling facility.

Rubbing bridge of her nose with her thumb and her index finger, she walked towards the computer. There were no new messages, so she decided to start a conversation.

ColonyCC: Are you feeling alright?

Without too much thinking, she hit the "send" button and having no idea what else she could write, she backed away and sat down on a windowsill. She instantly felt the warmth of the metal surface and the sunlight.

Her thoughts slowly left the topic of being alone and got back to the last day's events. The horrible, disfigured monstrosity that she and Peridot found in the kindergarten's facility stood before her eyes. What in the world was that thing? Well... It certainly was a gem, but what could change a gem into something like that?

A defect? It couldn't be... Sure, defective gems were often shaped differently than their regular versions, but it never was so severe. And they were never so aggressive. She never heard of any gem that would mindlessly attack everything that moved.

Was that some sort of experiment? But why would someone even do such a thing to a fellow gem? Why would someone want to corrupt another gem's form to the point of destroying its sanity? What monster would do that?

Maybe that was an attempt to made a gem stronger? Obviously a failed attempt...

'Peridot was right' she thought, 'We should have taken the database with us.'

Then again, it would probably break some rules. Some really strict rules because not everyone can look at some documents. But it's not like anyone would just leave something that required that amount of secrecy lying around in an old database of an abandoned kindergarten on a dead planet.

'Speaking of Peridot...' Agate jumped off of the windowsill and looked at the computer's holo screen. No messages. Nothing.

That was weird. Peridot always responded as quickly as possible. Even when she was working on something, she would check on her computer once in awhile.

'She is most likely working on the communication equipment... Maybe she temporarily disconnected something?' the orange gem wondered. She decided to stop waiting idly and do something useful. Unfortunately, the only thing left to do was the daily facility inspection that she was putting off since morning.

* * *

Like always, nothing in the entire facility was out of place. How could it be any different, though? Agate was the only living inhabitant of this place and she wasn't someone who would make a mess. Practically, she was only leaving the command centre once per day, for an inspection and even then she was only walking around and inspecting the lifeless base.

However this time she decided to change her schedule a little bit and while visiting the hangar, she entered the broken starship. She didn't really know why she did it. She had been here once before and it should have satisfied her curiosity, but something just pushed her inside.

The ship's interior was more spacious than anyone would think while looking at it from outside. It was divided into four sections placed on two floors. On the upper one held the crew's cabins and bridge. On the lower one - the reactor and cargo hold.

Agate walked into the bridge and sat down on the main pilot's seat. It was comfortable, way more comfortable than any seat or chair that could be found in the entire facility. She even wondered if it was acceptable to find a similar seat in the hangar and move it to the command centre.

She didn't recall any rule stating otherwise.

* * *

The pilot's seat scavenged from piles of different scrap and parts that littered the hangar was beaten up and dirty, but still really, really comfortable. And it didn't even stand out too much in sand covered command centre.

Agate smiled to herself, satisfied with her work. Finding, digging up and moving the seat was harder than one could think. Especially for a gem not used to manual labour.

But she did it! And now she could sit in front of her computer. And she did. The seat creaked quietly under her weight. It was high enough to comfortably access the holo console, which was a fairly important issue.

Her good mood didn't last long, though. It got replaced with worry at the same moment she looked at the communication app. Peridot still didn't respond. That wasn't like her at all.

Even when she was really preoccupied with something, she would make a break once in awhile and check if there were any messages. It was a habit that she probably acquired back when she was a part of the team with other defective peridots. Knowing about current orders was essential to survive.

The orange gem slowly stood up from her seat, still keeping an eye on the holo screen. After few moments of no new messages, she walked out of the command centre and headed towards the warp pad, trying to keep herself calm enough to walk at a normal pace.

Using the warp pad second time in two days was something really unusual lately. There just wasn't any places worth warping to or gems worth visiting. Not that Peridot wasn't someone that Agate didn't like to hang out with - she didn't really have many occasions to do that anyway.

But now wasn't the time to dwell on such things. Surrounded by blinding light, the orange gem flew through warp space. A journey that took only a few moments, seemed to last few days for the impatient and worried gem. When the white, cold glow was finally replaced with a warmth of sunlight, she relaxed a little. Having one's destination in sight felt a lot better than not seeing anything.

The warp pad of this small mining facility was located in the desert, separated from the facility with a short, metal pathway. Someone - Peridot to be precise - built a kind of curtain from metal plates. It prevented sand from burying the warp pad.

The mining outpost number zero-two-seven-four was located at the edge of an artificial cliff. The building was fairly small but had a tall watchtower from which the entire mine was operated. Its walls were all scratched by sandstorms and yet everything seemed neat and clean.

Everything seemed okay.

There were no external signs of any accidents whatsoever. No smoke from burning wires or the reactor, no severe damage to the structure.

But Peridot didn't respond to messages from her superior and that was enough for Agate to continue despite her observations. She walked towards the entrance and patted a touchscreen placed beside the door with the palm of her hand. With a silent rustle, the entrance opened and she proceeded inside.

She checked every corner of the facility. From the dark basement with the reactor, through living quarters, to the command room in the watchtower. Peridot was nowhere to be found.

Agate sighed heavily. Being worried sick wasn't new for her but that didn't mean she felt any better. She passed by the computer and slowly approached the exit to the balcony.

And then she nearly fell down.

Startled, she backed away and looked through opened balcony door. A pretty big part of the balcony was absent. Probably its support got destroyed by many sandstorms. She slowly approached the edge and carefully looked down.

\- Oh no... - she whispered to herself and rushed down the stairs.

Nearly falling on her face few times, she stormed out of the building and jumped onto the sand. She got around the facility to find a partially deconstructed metal box full of wires.

Beside it, on the sand, a fallen part of the balcony was lying. Crushed under it was Peridot. She was still trying to move the heavy metal thing, but her movements were slow and weak. Her eyes full of tears, she didn't notice the orange gem.

\- Peridot... - Agate was trying to sound as calm as possible. She didn't want to scare the already scared technician - Please, don't move.

\- M-my Agate - she sobbed. Her hands stopped trying to get a hold of the metal construction - I-I'm s-sorry...

\- You didn't do anything wrong - the orange gem quietly said. She took a close look at the pinned gem and instantly felt completely defeated.

A piece of the metal balcony fell right on Peridot's gem. Agate could see it, nearly cracked in half. There was no chance for the green technician.

But... If she just...

Agate slipped her hand under the metal rubble and started lifting the fallen construction as gently as she could. It wasn't easy - the part of the balcony was awfully heavy and not exactly simple to get a hold of.

After making enough space, the orange gem put her second hand under sobbing Peridot and gently pulled her body away from under the metal construction. Being sure that the smaller gem is relatively safe, she dropped the rubble.

\- I'll take you to the main base - she said to the technician - There should be something in the infirmary that will be able to patch you up.

But when she tried to lift Peridot in her arms, the smaller gem groaned in pain. Her eyes were full of horror, tears were streaming down her cheeks. To top it all off, she started to shake like a broken machine.

\- I don't want to shatter - she sobbed. Her voice was quiet and terrified. She clung tightly to her commander.

\- Hey... - Agate said softly - Everything will be okay.

That was a lie. She probably won't be able to carry the technician all the way back to the main facility without accidentally destroying her physical form. The smaller gem was too weak for that. And her gem was in a pitiful state.

There was a big, deep fissure in her green gemstone. Small bits of the stone were separated and lying inside of the crack. If the technician was to lose her physical form, her gem would probably fall apart.

Was there any hope?

Agate tried to not think about that. She tried to focus on coming up with some great ideas for rescuing Peridot. She was pretty bad at that, though. Only things she could think about were sadness and fear of being alone.

\- I don't want to shatter... - Peridot's whisper was barely audible. Her embrace tightened greatly and a moment later there was only a cloud of white dust that quickly disappeared into the air.

Small, green gemstone fell down, bounced off Agate's thigh and landed in the sand, broken into few pieces.

The orange gem wanted to scream, but she couldn't find enough will to do it. She got on her feet just to slump down beside a wall a moment later.

The desert was hot and empty. Even more empty than usual.

* * *

She sat there for the rest of the day and left when the sun finally set. The remains of her subordinate were bubbled and taken to the main facility. Then she left it in one room in the living quarters, among other bubbles.

Agate sometimes wondered if she would be punished for keeping those shards if the higher ups found out. Not that it would ever happen. Especially now, without a single active gem beside her.

According to the official rules, every shattered gem should be recycled. And as much as the orange gem liked to follow these rules, she couldn't bring herself to do that. Every single bubble levitating in the living quarters was not only full of shards but also memories. Precious, sad memories.

With mind packed with thoughts like that, even the old pilot seat stopped being comfortable. There was not enough of the soft material, the metal parts were poking Agate's butt, and the whole structure was alarmingly wobbly. She was still sitting there, though. Sad expression on her face, her eyes fixated on a holo screen that will never again show any new messages.

It was really weird feeling, that sadness she felt this time. It was empty, but she could feel something in her slowly boiling. There was also regret. She regretted that she had never broken the rules and gathered every gem left on the planet in the main facility. The outposts weren't worth protecting and living in a group would be so much better than all those years of loneliness.

Who knows? Maybe instead of a pile of shards, she would live with a bunch of friends. If she could solve all problems with social contact between her and her subordinates, that is.

A small tear run down her cheek. She didn't even bother to wipe it off.

If she was to break the rules and form a group, they could maybe even repair that old ship and fly away.

Or not...

It probably would alarm Homeworld's forces and bring destruction wherever they would go. Homeworld was too powerful to oppose it. Too powerful to fight it. Too powerful to even try to hide. Sometimes Agate was scared to even think badly about Homeworld in case that the Diamonds could somehow hear her thoughts.

But as far as she knew, they couldn't. And they were good enough to build a pretty good base on this horrible planet. A base that didn't let her down for all those years.

She nearly fell out of her seat when the power went out and with it every single light source.

Then Agate jumped up and immediately fell on her face. She stumbled over a floor tile that was slightly standing out. That was the first time she actually noticed this imperfection. Not her proudest moment.

But it wasn't a very long moment as she quickly stood up and lit up her gemstone. A slightly orange light revealed a door frame and a fragment of a corridor. The gem ran through it and headed towards the warehouse where she tried to get inside the reactor chamber.

It seemed to be a futile effort, the door was sealed and it was impossible to open them without hacking the console. Which was impossible without electricity. And electricity was unavailable without access to the reactor. It wasn't like Agate could repair it. She had no clue about technology that complicated.

The orange gem screamed with anger and punched the metal wall, leaving a shallow dent.

\- Stupid planet, stupid base, stupid Diamonds! - she yelled into the empty warehouse, falling on her knees.

Agate felt lost. The last thing that kept her loyal - the base that gave her a chance of survival - had just fallen. Without energy, the facility was going to fall apart. In next few years, it would turn into a metal skeleton filled with sand and rust. There was no hope now.

She slowly stood up and nearly lost her balance. After a moment of standing still, she started looking around the warehouse, a storm of thoughts was rampaging in her head.

What exactly did the Diamonds do for her? Beside not shattering her right after the first inspection where she had been proven defective.

They gave her a home. But one on a dying planet. Dangerous and dull.

They gave her a purpose. But one that she was never meant to have. One that was impossible to fulfil because of a random mistake during her creation.

And finally, they gave her power. They trusted her in a leadership position and put her over other gems. She remembered the exact moment like it was yesterday.

It was the end of the evacuation of Homeworld's forces. Last groups of gems were boarding the starships. It was a time of a great uncertainty for the defective personnel of the colony. There was no information about them being evacuated. Morale was at an all-time low.

But then a great holographic screen popped up on the sky. Everyone gasped and saluted when the face of the powerful Yellow Diamond showed up on it. She said that she was putting the colony in the hands of the defective gems. She trusted them to protect it and maintain it. She said that she believed they would be able to fulfil her orders. That she believed in THEM.

It was the single greatest moment in her life. The single greatest moment in the life of every defective gem that was constantly assaulted both physically and mentally by higher-ups and some more cocky gems. It was a change that would make their lives better.

But the truth was different. They were lied to. Leaving the defective gems on the abandoned colony was just an easy way to get rid of them. To get rid of a problem. To get rid of the filth from ranks of Diamond Authority's forces.

And now, Agate wasn't afraid of thinking about it. She wasn't even afraid of talking about it. She couldn't care anymore. Now the only thing she could live for was herself. No one needed to be taken care of, no one who would criticise her for her opinions and choices.

She was free!

She was finally free...

Yet, she still felt empty. Betrayed. Lonely.

She snatched a piece of artificial canvas from a pile of batteries and closely examined them. Somehow some of them were still working. Small screens showed that they were still charged. Not fully but electricity is electricity.

For a while, she wondered what to do with them but suddenly she remembered a fragment of her training. A chapter of the manual named "jumpstarting starship's reactor". Beside technicians, most of the gems that usually participated in combat were taught that. Agates apparently also needed that knowledge.

With a newfound hope, Agate took as many working batteries as she could and ran blindly towards the hangar. Thankfully, the gates, both to the warehouse and to the hangar, were open. The emergency mechanisms opened them in the moment of rector's death.

Few moments of running through sand and nearly stumbling on the garbage littering the hangar, she got to the ship. She dumped the batteries on the floor and went to the reactor chamber.

It looked pretty okay. Okay-ish.

She couldn't really tell. It was in one piece but who knows what was inside. There could be a complete mess inside, there could be no fuel. It could just explode after jumpstarting attempt.

She didn't care anymore, though. Nothing could really make the current situation worse. So she just took the battery and stuck it in the right slot. Finding the proper switches and valves, she arranged them in required positions. Soon, the reactor came to life. Various lights turned on and the entire structure quickly became warm. Everything seemed to be working properly which made Agate exclaim with joy.

The orange gem instantly left the reactor chamber and dashed towards the bridge. The ship's main computer was humming silently, its holographic screen showed Diamond Authority symbol and a constantly updating system check log.

She turned on one of the other ship's computers and started to look through the files. There was only the default data - nothing created by the previous crew. It had probably been deleted by the technicians. But the thing that Agate was searching for was still there, the Starship' manual. In it contained everything that was needed to successfully maintain, repair and pilot the ship.

The orange gem smiled widely and started reading.

* * *

**I hope you liked it. Please, leave some feedback.**

**And again - big thanks to Mellium for beta reading this story.**

**~MS**


	4. Through Metal and Sand

4\. Through Metal and Sand

Since the reactor's death, Agate stopped keeping track of time. It was the computer's job and when the machine went off for the last time, the need for doing that completely disappeared.

There still was some weird date-calculating operations going on in the ship's main computer but the orange gem didn't pay it much attention. She was preoccupied with various tasks that were far more important than being aware of the length of this horrible banishment.

It turned out that ship maintenance was really easy to understand, yet quite tedious and time-consuming. Agate needed to check pretty much every screw and every bolt on the vessel to make sure it wouldn't fall apart right after the takeoff.

She spent most of her time walking around the ship with a small, portable holo screen that she had found somewhere on the bridge. She felt like a peridot - always looking at screens and tinkering with electronics.

Thanks to the maintenance process and scans that the ship's main computer had conducted right after it was turned on, she knew what required repairs. Thankfully, the list wasn't too long, though most of the repairs were quite crucial. One of the engines was busted, some of the wires lost most of their insulation and there were many spots that weren't hermetic enough for a space voyage.

Agate added another note to the list of required parts and took a short break. Never in last few thousands of years had she worked that hard. Last time she felt that tired was probably back when this colony actually meant something.

She turned the holo tablet off and went out of the ship. After stretching her limbs, she looked around the cluttered hangar. Between ship maintenance sessions, she cleaned a bit and now there was a lot more free space around the vessel. Organising this mess with only her gem as a source of light was a real hassle, so the orange gem assembled a quite powerful lamp out of few high-voltage, crystal light bulbs, some old wires, a partially rusted metal rack and one of the batteries she'd previously taken from the warehouse. It was powerful enough to illuminate over a half of the hangar and cast some really creepy shadows. They reminded her of the gem monster that she and Peridot had fought in the kindergarten.

Agate wondered if that was some kind of trauma caused by seeing the horrifying monstrosity or just an irrational fear, just her being defective. She headed towards the abandoned base. She didn't really need to go there but she had some ideas about where to find some wires in good condition.

The inside of the base was dark and a lot warmer than before. Heaps of sand were lying on the floor and probably on every other flat surface. Filters in the ventilation system were completely useless without power.

Passing through the canteen that was messier than ever, she looked at the command centre entrance for a moment. For this moment, she felt like she needed to go there and sit in front of the computer for another few days. Then she smiled to herself and continued her little trip - she was free now.

A few moments later she arrived in the infirmary. Without the cold light of the lamps and colourful, flickering diodes, the place looked completely different. Uncomfortable and dead. There was also the sand. It was the first time this amount of sand had managed to get inside.

When her gem's light fell on the accelerator of the reforming process, she suddenly felt incredible guilt. On a tiny platform, under no longer working lamps and a fresh layer of sand, lied a green gemstone.

She gently picked it up and cleared it off the dust. The gemstone's surface was smooth and cold. It looked so small and fragile in Agate's hand. Without hesitation, she bubbled it and took it with her. She wouldn't be able to forgive herself if she hadn't.

Before getting out of the infirmary, she found a panel on the wall and removed it. The removal process was quite unusual - she didn't take any tools with her so she needed to use force and punch the wall until the panel opened. Good thing that the parts she wanted weren't going to be damaged. Her hand, though, ached from the force.

Massaging her slightly injured hand, the orange gem lit up the hole in the wall and looked through the mass of wires. They were easily detachable, just like she remembered. She only needed to get a hold of them and cautiously pull them off. With a quiet pop, they disconnected and Agate could wrap them around her wrist.

With salvaged parts, she walked out of the room and looked around the corridor. She could see the room she used to store her fallen comrades' gemstones.

She didn't really visit them in a long time. Sure, she had put Peridot's remains there a little while ago, but she didn't stick around for too long.

With her legs acting on their own, she walked towards the opened door to the shard room. Soon her gem's light illuminated its inside. There were countless bubbles, peacefully levitating in the air. Only a few of them weren't orange.

A tear ran down her cheek. She remembered the first gem that had been shattered after she had been promoted to the position of the colony commander. Two jaspers from colony security forces have come to her, both incredibly distressed. One of them was carefully carrying a carnelian gemstone that was falling apart. It had already been in few pieces when they arrived at the command centre. They were crying and begged Agate to fix their friend.

She couldn't.

She didn't have the power to bring shattered gems back to life.

No one did.

It took so long to convince the crying jasper to just bubble the crushed gemstone. She and her friend weren't able to work for next few days and didn't want to tell what had happened to the carnelian.

\- "Thank you" - Agate said quietly. She hugged the bubble with the last gem that remained intact close to her chest - "It was great to serve with you."

Then she just left the room silently, still holding the bubbled green gem close. Without wasting time on base exploration, she headed towards the hangar to continue repairing the ship.

* * *

Finding a working capacitor in a giant pile of junk proven to be a difficult challenge. There was a surprisingly huge amount of pieces of metal. Some panels, tonnes of barely usable bolts and screws of various sizes, spools of wire in really poor condition and other rusty parts. It was like someone deconstructed an entire mining facility and then dumped it in the empty hangar.

Agate couldn't help but wonder when it had occurred. It must have happened during her command because before that, the giant hangar was full of ships. Yet, she didn't recall such an event and most definitely didn't recall giving an order to deconstruct anything.

The peridots were given a lot of freedom, though, so it could be just a case of lawlessness. Some weird idea, a project that never reached its completion. Whatever it was, it made the orange gem a bit angry at herself. She should have been more interested in what her subordinates were doing back then. It could've helped her current situation. Or even have saved some lives...

Irritated by the ever returning guilt, she stopped thinking and focused on poking the heaps of trash she was walking on with a pipe that had broken off of something. Over two hundred units separated her from the ship and there was still a lot of space in front of her. Like... a lot. Her hand built lamp couldn't illuminate even a half of the hangar. Walking around the pile of junk was like exploring some fallen city on an alien planet in the middle of the night.

Sure - she had walked through this place countless times when the facility was still functioning. Through the alleys of metal and random parts. She never went too far, though. And it had always been bright.

Agate made another few steps, a bit slower than the ones before. She moved the pipe a bit more cautiously, digging in the mass of metal while looking for another part from her list. The pile of junk was gradually becoming thinner. Soon, the orange gem could clearly see the floor of the hangar. And when she lifted her head, her mouth opened in shock.

There were stacks of parts that looked nearly brand new. All neatly organised and marked with symbols and numbers. It partially solved the mystery of peridots' plot. Only partially. And it was a pretty small part of the answer.

Yet it was most definitely a really useful discovery. She could already see a dozen pieces of the part she was looking for and some other that could potentially be useful. If she just knew a bit more about technical stuff in general, she would be even able to upgrade the vessel.

Before collecting what she needed, she decided to explore a bit more. Walking around the stacks of spare parts, she tried to remember what was worth taking. As she kept walking it became harder and harder to keep track of everything so she pulled out her holo-tablet and began marking a new list.

Soon it turned out that peridots had not only collected parts for some unknown reason but they had also found a way to entertain themselves. Or something like that... Agate didn't really know what all the items collected on the simple, metal table were for, so she could only guess.

There was a few differently shaped pieces of metal with numbers printed on the sides. Beside them lied unpowered holo-tablets marked with differently coloured crystal rings. The biggest item on the table was a figurine handmade out of junk. It looked more or less like some warrior gem.

Agate was completely uninterested in this stuff. It didn't look like anything really important and since there was no one else on the entire planet who could explain to her what it all was about, she wasn't interested.

Instead, her attention focused back on the parts. She abandoned the old table and started collecting all the junk that she decided was worth taking. After a while, it turned out that there was too much stuff for the orange gem to carry. She just couldn't hold so many things in her hands nor could she bubble something as big as all collected parts together.

She needed to find a way to bring everything back to the ship in as few trips as possible. She would rather not spend the entire day on carrying junk around. Thankfully, she remembered that she had seen something that would be useful back when she took batteries from the warehouse.

Without wasting any more time, she hurried back, running through the piles of junk while shielding her eyes from the blinding light of her hand-made lamp. Passing by the ship, she left her holo-tablet on one of the workbenches she'd set up near the vessel. Then she proceeded through the hangar's gate, the central training square and finally the warehouse's gate.

She didn't even need to search. The big, artificial canvas lied in plain sight, slightly covered with sand. She started walking in its direction but nearly tripped on something. She looked at her feet and froze.

It was a sword. Yellow blade, simple construction without a crossguard but quite long - made for big quartz soldiers.

Agate felt really cold chills going down her back. This particular sword was used by one of the jaspers and witnessed something that still haunted the orange gem's memories.

This particular jasper was a bit different than her peers. Unusual even for a defective gem. Her gemstone was flawed. Some foreign material contaminated it making it partially off-colour. Jasper herself had the same problem - half of her face, her neck, half of her breast and one of her arms were in a different colour than rest of her body. What's worse, those body parts affected by this weird impurity were lagging. Always slower than her healthy limbs.

It made her a bit frustrated. To vent, she trained. Every day she sparred with other jaspers. And when they were too tired, she just headed to the warehouse and cleaned her sword. Fighting was her entire life.

It's not hard to imagine how more frustrated she grew when every other quartz soldier got shattered. She was the last one of the security forces and she was pissed. She started to punch walls, swing her sword and harass other gems. Agate had quickly put an end to this toxic behaviour but before she could talk with Jasper, the troubled gem escaped to the warehouse.

They found her only a few moments later. Or rather what was left of her. A handful of shards. She stabbed herself through her gemstone. Since then nobody touched the old weapon.

But maybe it was a right time to do that?

Agate leant down and picked up the blade. It was pretty heavy and partially damaged by sand but still sharp enough to hurt someone.

With this sharp piece of metal in her hand, the orange gem took the canvas and headed towards the gate, her head full of uncomfortable thoughts.

Outside of the warehouse, she stopped. Something wasn't right. The wind picked up a bit, sending little specks of sand and dust flying. She turned towards the desert and her eyes widened. There was a massive, ruddy cloud on the horizon. It looked as if a giant monster with billions of tangled limbs and screaming faces was rushing through the sand. It was getting closer.

A sandstorm.

She instantly hurried inside the hangar and dropped her things by the ship. The sword made loud, metallic bang that echoed through the building. Agate couldn't really care about that right now. She jumped towards the opened hangar's gate and started to frantically search for manual control panel placed on the floor. After a moment of struggling with a rusted mechanism, she opened a small panel to find a bunch of wires, pipes, valves and levers. The orange gem had little to no idea what all those things were for but, fortunately for her, one of the levers was brightly coloured and marked with appropriate symbols. Without wasting any more time, she pulled it.

But nothing happened.

The gate didn't move even a half of unit and the wind was picking up.

Agate started panicking a bit. She tried to remember other emergency protocols and succeeded after a moment. There was a little hole in the gate in which one could stick a metal lever. Then a quartz soldier could manually close the gate.

The orange gem quickly found said hole. Then she turned around and ran towards the junk pile, nearly tripping few times. There, she found a piece of metal that fit and ran back to thrust it into the slot. When she was sure that it wasn't going to just pop out of the hole, she started pushing.

The gate was awfully heavy and moved like the mechanism was full of gravel. Agate clenched her teeth as she slowly advanced forward with a metal pipe in her hands. The fact that her feet were slipping a bit on the ubiquitous sand wasn't helping at all.

She felt like her gemstone was about to crack when the metal gate finally stopped. But it wasn't fully closed yet. There was still an opening the size of her fist. That may not sound that bad but a hole of that size still would cause a lot of chaos.

The orange gem just got back to the junk pile, took as much of metal panels as she could carry and then started to stick them into the opening. After a while she needed to shield her eyes from the sand that was getting through the holes. Finally, she managed to close the hole enough to be sure that nothing inside would be damaged by the sandstorm.

There still was a certain danger, though. The makeshift barricade won't hold forever and the massive sandstorm might just get through. She needed to protect the ship.

Thus, there was no time for rest. She took the canvas and ran towards the junk pile. The trip to the peridots' place was awfully draining. She needed to mind where to put her feet to not trip. But she finally arrived at her destination.

There, she spread the canvas on the floor and put every single part she earlier prepared on it. Then she folded it and picked it up like a travelling bag. It turned out to be pretty heavy, so the trip back took a little longer.

When she got back to the vessel, she climbed inside it and went straight to the engine room. She needed to get back outside to get her holo-tablet but soon she was working at one of the most important pieces of equipment - the shields generator.

Space travel, space exploration and space warfare without a functioning shields were, in the long run, a suicide. There was a surprisingly huge amount of things that can destroy a starship out there in the "dark void of cosmos".

An energy shield like that could also protect ship on the ground. Like it would in the situation Agate was right now. No airborne piece of sand would be able to pierce it.

But getting this system to work wasn't that easy. It wasn't essentially broken but the orange gem didn't want to turn it on when there were other problems with the vessel. She needed to make sure that the shields generator would be connected to the reactor and correctly regulated. If she was to make even the smallest mistake, the entire thing could just melt.

Keeping that in mind, Agate connected last wires and tapped the touch screen few times. She did everything according to the instructions downloaded from the ship's computer system. Then she checked everything, double checked and finally triple checked before turning the shields on.

The entire vessel hummed loudly. Control lights on the shields' control panel lit up and turned green. Everything was okay. Everything worked.

It only took a moment before an extremely exhausted Agate collapsed on the floor.

* * *

Sitting up slowly, Agate wondered if she dematerialized for some time or just lost consciousness. Trying to collect her thoughts, the orange gem stood up and started walking towards the bridge. She kept her hand on a wall to make sure she wouldn't collapse again.

After sitting down on the pilot's seat, she turned on the ship's main computer and went through a regulation checking of all the systems. The machine was a lot faster in comparison to when it scanned itself a few days earlier so Agate had her results after just a moment. Everything seemed to be in working order. The shields had been working continuously since the orange gem had turned them on and there were no problems with power nor any of the vessel's systems, they weren't brand new by any means but they weren't in any worse state than before so that was a good sign.

Agate turned her eyes away from the screen and looked at another one. It showed the interior of the hangar. There was no sand flying around. She also didn't hear any loud noises coming from outside. The sandstorm must've ended.

Entire ship hummed with a low vibrating energy as the shields were powered down. The orange gem walked out of the vessel and looked around. There was a lot more sand on the floor than usual but nothing was seriously damaged. One of the workbenches was flipped upside down and all the things that had been previously collected on it were scattered across the ground. The barricade mostly held out. A few panels were pushed and bent out of place by the wind but most of them were still stuck in place. Unfortunately, the hangar's gate was also stuck. No more quick trips to the warehouse.

Agate picked up the earlier discarded blade and examined it closely. It was covered with a thin layer of ruddy dust. She cleaned it with her hand before taking it inside the ship. There, she put it beside the peridot gemstone, on one of the seats in the bridge.

The possibility of leaving this dying planet was closer than ever.

**I hope you liked this chapter.**

**As always - big thanks to  Mellium for the beta-reading.**

**And thanks to ty and EssentiallyClingyOne for their reviews.**

**MS**


	5. Outside and away

5\. Outside and away

With slightly panicked expression, Agate quickly turned the engines off. A few different alarms stopped making all kinds of annoying sounds and every red control light changed back to green. The entire vessel seemed to calm down. There was no more humming and the outside cameras were surrounded by smoke.

The orange gem immediately jumped out of the bridge and ran outside. She walked around the vessel to examine the main engines. They were, thankfully, undamaged. The immense heat that they just produced was enough to melt a part of the catwalk leading to the base but by some miracle it didn't damage the ship in any way.

Agate fell on her knees and started laughing maniacally for a few long moments. After her laughter had subsided and she calmed down considerably, she sighed deeply. If something bad had happened to the engines, she wouldn't have been able to fix them. The parts required to build an engine of this class were far too special to just lie in a pile of junk that a team of peridots salvaged from... somewhere...

She collected herself and stood up, cleaning her pants off of sand that got stuck to them. Then she walked to back to the ship and went straight to the engine room.

Something must've been really wrong. Really, really wrong. With the engines or the reactor, or even with something between the two. And since she couldn't risk another outburst of energy, she needed to check everything.

So she did.

It wasn't that easy, though. Most of the things that needed to be checked were hidden in tight spaces or entangled in wires. She also needed to be careful with her hands. They were a lot bigger than the average peridot's hands, so she could easily damage something by accident.

Because of that, the entire inspection process took far too long which made Agate a bit upset. She felt frustrated about every single situation that slowed her down.

The problem that she finally identified turned out to be quite simple. One of the fuses, one that she replaced, wasn't screwed in hard enough. That was it, she didn't even need to go for any spare parts.

She wanted to cry and laugh at the same time. This day made her afraid about her mental health. Not all the depressing situations, bad memories and constantly returning guilt but the rapid changes in her mood.

She didn't want to become a crazy gem, floating aimlessly through space.

To clear her mind, she once again got back to work. There were only a few things between her and getting off of this planet and she was really eager to start her new journey.

First, she needed to turn the engines on again and run some tests. Depending on the results, she would start to prepare herself for the flight or try to fix whatever would come up. After that, the only thing left to do would be opening the hangar's main gate.

Right after getting back to the bridge, Agate sat down on the pilot's seat and took a deep breath. Moving her hand slowly, she touched the screen of the main computer and turned on the flight mode. Holographic images appeared in front of the machine and on its both sides. She found a slider marked with a thruster symbol and moved it upwards cautiously.

The power of the engines could be felt throughout the entire vessel and judging by all the green lights, everything was okay. All the information that was showing on the screens suggested that everything was working like it should.

The orange gem smiled a little and proceeded to check other thrusters. She wanted to run out of the hangar, screaming happily when every single engine turned out to be working perfectly.

Happier than ever, Agate walked out of the ship and started bringing all the things she wanted to take with her. Those were mostly spare parts but she also took the artificial canvas from the warehouse, three batteries that somehow survived the sandstorm and the peridot-made figurine that she found while exploring the hangar.

But when she finished bringing everything on the ship, her mood plummeted and she stopped in her tracks. She started thinking about all the bubbles she was about to leave in this horrible place. Something was urging her to take them with her, to protect her shattered comrades...

But it wasn't healthy. She wasn't able to do anything for the fallen and taking the remains of those poor gems with her would only make her suffer.

She needed to move on.

Sighing deeply, Agate turned towards the hangar's main gate. It was a giant metal curtain, divided into four parts and located on the full length of the longer wall of the hangar.

She hadn't really put that much thought into this part of her plan. She really hadn't even wanted to think about it. Opening this monstrosity seemed impossible and it was making her really anxious.

She could barely remember how the gate was opened in normal circumstances. With trepidation, she walked towards it and started to examine it. It turned out that every part was kept in place by four locks, each one as big as her head. There should also be a special hydraulic system able to close the massive metal gate and slow down its fall.

Upon closer examination, she found an emergency control panel. She opened it and, without having any expectations whatsoever, pulled a giant lever that was in the middle of the panel.

With a startling sound, every single lock snapped open. Every section of the gate fell down into the holes in the floor. A loud squeal of metal against metal shook the facility. Behind it, there was a breathtaking view of the desert. A local star was shining brightly from behind the remains of the destroyed moon.

Agate was so in shock that it took a moment before the view finally hit her. The breathtaking view and the sudden expanse of space around her caused her to fall back on the floor. Her eyes were wide with shock and awe. She wasn't prepared for something like that.

When she managed to calm herself down, she didn't waste any more time. She jumped up and ran towards the ship. After closing the vessel's entrance, she went straight to the bridge and turned the main computer on.

The bottom thrusters switched on with a quiet hum and slowly the ship lifted in the air, blowing all the sand to the sides. Then the landing gear slowly retracted back into the ship's underside and the main engines started to heat up.

The vessel slowly flew out of the hangar and hovered near the cliff on the top of which the facility was built. Then, in a blink of an eye, the ship was gone.

It took only a few moments to get through the planet's atmosphere. Agate could see the moon and all the stars that were visible from the planet's surface and more.

She wanted to visit them all. Never in her entire life had she felt such freedom. She was ecstatic.

But she couldn't just travel randomly through space. She needed to find a place she could call a home. A place where she would be free and relatively safe.

Thus, she needed information and as far as she knew, the information was stored in the moon base.

* * *

A quiet ping sounded out, notifying Agate that the ship had arrived at the previously assigned destination. She didn't really need this information, though. She was staring at the moon since the vessel left the thin atmosphere of the dying planet.

The surface of the natural satellite was covered by a mass of yellow clouds. When she had observed it from the planet, the moon had a beautiful golden glow.

Aside from being pretty, this little celestial body didn't have any other values. It was completely useless. There was no valuable resources or any anomalies that could be analysed and used to make some progress in science.

But it was an ideal place to build a diamond base. A perfect facility to store important data and to easily communicate with the rest of the empire. It was a key component of every colony. They were usually built first to establish communication with Homeworld and plan the colony's development. When there was no moon suitable for such a construction, a space station was created on future colony's orbit.

The orange gem could probably get to the moon base by the warp pad, though she wasn't sure if the off-planet warp still worked. Teleporting through space was a tiny bit harder than teleporting on planets and because of that, the equipment was a lot more fragile.

The ship's computer notified its new pilot once again. This time it was about available landing area. Along with the notification, the vessel asked if Agate wanted to start the landing sequence. Thankful for all those conveniences, she tapped the "yes" button and sat back on the comfortable pilot seat.

The ship descended through the yellow clouds below and was soon shrouded by them. One could barely see anything through the moon's atmosphere.

Thankfully, the yellow gas was getting thinner under the fifty units thick cloud-level. Closer to the surface it was barely visible, although still managed to make everything a bit more yellow than it should be.

For example - the landing pad was originally silver like the entire facility but now seemed to be in a dirty shade of yellow. Agate couldn't look at it for too long, though. The ship started the landing sequence and the moon's surface disappeared in its blind zone.

The ship descended slowly, extending its landing equipment and blowing away all the yellow-coloured dust that was covering the landing area. The touchdown was a little rough but didn't damage anything. It only managed to scare Agate a little.

Excluding this little incident, the orange gem was really excited. This was the first time she had ever been this far from the colony. For the first time, she was seeing something truly new.

Although, it wasn't all that different. The moon was empty and seemingly dead. Only differences between it and the planet were the colour of sand and the yellow clouds.

It didn't really bother Agate, though. She was still enjoying every new experience. A part of her felt even better - as a defective gem, she didn't have the smallest chance of getting to this diamond moon base legally and the fact that she was standing in front of the said facility was making her ridiculously happy.

The moon base was tall, silver and had a Diamond Authority symbol attached to its wall right over the entrance. The entrance itself was bigger than the gates to the hangar and warehouse back on the colony. Agate had expected it - it was designed to fit diamonds after all.

There was something wrong, though. Something wrong with the entrance. It was opened wide and the control panel that was placed beside it was smashed to bits. Someone or something must've entered the facility.

'But why?' wondered Agate. She couldn't really think of any reason someone would do such a thing other than getting information. Information that was in the native language to Homeworld. And she was pretty sure that a gem would be able to open the entrance without devastating the control panel.

The only other options were that another stellar civilisation or a wild creature had broken in. The orange gem didn't really know about other civilisations advanced enough to fly through space and brave enough to wander into the territory of the Diamond Authority. The wild creature theory was far more probable.

She couldn't be sure, though. She didn't have access to any data on the topic of this moon. Nothing about its surface, atmosphere, flora or fauna. The only fact she could be sure of was that there was a diamond base in front of her eyes. What she could see and hear was what she had. She was going in blind.

After a brief consideration, she went back to the ship and took the jasper's sword with her. She preferred to be armed in case of an attack. There could be any manner of creatures living in the moon base.

With a sharp piece of metal in hand and a little bit more courage than before, the orange gem entered the cold, dark interior of the diamond base. She needed to light up her gem to see anything but when she did, she whistled in an awe. The walls of the base were covered with four giant frescoes that were portraying the four diamonds. Never in her life had she seen her species' art in that great condition. No matter how bad she hated the Diamond Authority, the frescoes were beautiful.

And she felt unexpected anger when she noticed layers of a light-yellow web that covered most of the flat space in the round room. In the corners, between the floor and walls, there were cocoons and tangled masses made of the same web. More of the stuff was dropping from the entrance to the second floor.

Agate gripped the sword tighter and slowly headed towards the second floor's entrance. When she was right below it, stairs started to slide out of the wall. They were diamond-sized, so climbing them wasn't the easiest thing in the world but she managed to do it. After few long moments, she was at the height of the second floor.

It was already pretty obvious at this point that there might be some kind of alien creature in the building. Probably pre-sentient at that. It wasn't unreasonable to be wary and ready for a fight. Especially after seeing the second floor.

It was covered in a thick layer of the web. There were far more cocoons and one of them, placed in the middle of the room, was really big. Something inside was moving slowly.

The orange gem didn't linger there for very long. In fact, she just shined her gemstone's light on all the nasty stuff gathered on the second floor and then quickly got back to climbing the stairs.

The third and last floor was a lot cleaner. There was a little amount of web here and there but the animal didn't seem to visit this place very often. Perhaps because a good half of the walls and the ceiling were made out of thick glass that was letting through the faint light from outside. Agate could see a silhouette of the planet. It was a bit smaller than she thought it would be, but the view was breathtaking anyway.

But she wasn't there to observe planets hidden by yellow mist. She looked around the room. In the middle, there was a diamond sized armchair and a computer console. It was white, beautiful and slightly covered with this weird web.

The orange gem cleaned it all up a bit and sat down in the giant armchair. It was kind of uncomfortable for a gem of her size but it wasn't really an issue. She found a symbol of a hand on the left armrest and put her - a lot smaller - hand on it. The symbol pulsated with white light and soon the computer console turned on. A big holo-screen appeared over it, showing different logs and options.

It took a while for her to find the archive. It turned out that the computer wasn't updated in a really long time. To the point that the communication protocols changed so much that it couldn't form a connection with homeworld. That meant that the information on the computer's disk was horribly outdated. The last important entry in the logs was about a rebellion on the new colony and the great exodus of the homeworld forces followed by use of a weapon of mass destruction.

This entry instantly grabbed her attention, so she investigated the case. Said planet was a rocky planet, the third one from the local star. It was rich in different resources and full of organic life - both pre-sentient and in really early stages of creating civilisation.

There was a plan of creating a high level industrial and residential colony on the planet's surface after terraforming it to meet all the requirements of advanced gem technology.

Apparently, a rebellious faction formed and some gems started to fight with homeworld forces to protect local organic life. The small, guerilla operations soon turned into a full-fledged war. At some point, the rebel leader - a rose quartz gem - infiltrated the Pink Diamond's court and shattered the diamond.

Agate was speechless. A gem attacking a diamond? It was unheard of! It was unheard of! It was horrible! Terrifying! Heart-breaking!

It was extremely interesting and actually inspiring. Agate was instantly hooked and wanted to know more and more. Unfortunately, most of the information in the archives was about various battles, war and situation on the planet in general. The only other data she found about this event was a picture of the rose quartz and an order to destroy her physical form on sight.

The gem in the picture was looking mighty and confident but also kind. She had a light-pink skin and a mass of pink, curly hair. The orange gem found her face quite motivating.

With this motivation, she was finally able to decide on where to head on her journey. The planet where the rebellion happened was to become her first destination. No matter how the rebellion ended, successful or not, she wanted to at least see the place.

She quickly memorised the planet's sector and its exact coordinates. She wished she had a way to save them somewhere but unfortunately, she left her holo-tablet on the ship and frankly, she didn't want to spend more time on this planet than necessary.

After few moments, with a string of numbers in her mind, she stood up and started to head towards the stairs. She stopped almost immediately.

In front of her, halfway hidden in the entrance to the lower floor, stood a rather big creature. Its body was long and was in a similar colour to the web that covered the interior of the base. It had a small head with four small orbs on its sides that probably served as eyes. Six long, lanky legs were supporting its weight, a sharp claw on the end of every single one of them.

The monster lifted one of its legs and struck Agate, aiming right at her head. The long limb was moving at a frightening speed but the gem somehow managed to protect herself with her energy shield. With a small flash of an orange light, the sharp claw bounced off.

The creature lost its balance for a moment giving the orange gem a chance to change her position. She jumped behind the giant armchair but the piece of white, crystal furniture quickly got shattered by another furious blow.

Agate didn't waste a chance and attacked too. She swung her sword towards the limb that was currently stuck in the ruined armchair. The blade pierced its hard exoskeleton and stopped halfway in the lanky leg. The wild creature didn't react in any way other than yanking its limb back. Screeches or hisses would've been expected from a creature of this size, scary but expected. No, Agate was more terrified of the fact that the wild animal was completely silent, not even a cry of pain from the wound she had given it. It was really creepy and unnerved her.

The wounded leg didn't bleed but the monster still curled it close to its body. It didn't attack so recklessly anymore but it was still sitting in the middle of the entrance, blocking the way out of the building.

The orange gem didn't really have any clever ideas on how to get through. Thus, she decided to just charge at the beast with her shield in front of her. The monster didn't expect its opponent to be so bold and aggressive. With a charge, the energy shield slammed right into its head. The shield's power made the monster bounce off towards the wall. After the collision, the monster completely lost its balance and tumbled down the stairs.

Agate quickly rose up from the floor where she landed after slamming into the monster and run downstairs. The beast managed to shake off the initial shock of the blow and was making its way towards the centre of the second floor. It stopped in front of the giant cocoon and lifted its front legs defensively, ready to attack if anything got too close.

The orange gem was able to correctly read the creature's motives and started to slowly walk towards the stairs. With her shield high and the jasper sword in her firm grasp, she kept her eyes on it as she kept a constant, steady motion towards the lower floor.

When she finally arrived at the bottom of the base, she didn't look behind anymore. She just ran. Out of the building and through the yellow mist towards the vessel. Agate pretty much jumped inside and closed the entrance behind her. She looked in every single place inside the ship to make sure that no monster had snuck inside.

After that, she turned on the engines and entered the coordinates that she found in the diamond base into the ship's main computer. She wanted to get as far away from this system as possible.

**I hope you enjoyed reading this chapter.**

**As per usual - big thanks to Mellium for the beta-reading.**

**Once again: thanks for your comments ty and EssentiallyClingyOne.**

**~MS**


	6. Time and space

6\. Time and space

It didn't take Agate too long to realise how awfully boring the space travelling was. The outside view was amazing only for the first few months, especially when something really interesting could be observed relatively up close. Like a pulsar, some interesting planet or a nebula. Unfortunately for the most time only darkness and little specks of light could be seen.

The inside of the ship wasn't really too interesting. There were not many things to do among empty cabins and ship's mechanisms. Walking around got tedious very quickly. Swinging the jasper's sword could potentially damage the vessel and spending time with the peridot gemstone would only make the orange gem depressed.

Theoretically, Agate could pass some time tinkering and trying to improve the ship's systems. But there weren't enough materials and the orange gem's knowledge wasn't advanced enough to safely do such a thing.

The only thing left to do was to think. And she started to think really, really hard. She even started to note some of her thoughts on her holo screen.

She mainly pondered about the various gem issues but she was also thinking about the history of her previous home - history of the abandoned colony. Things and events that she could only know about from old archives.

She remembered all the information about different organic beings she had read about. Imagining how great would be to see them alive and in the wild turned out to be a pretty entertaining exercise. Her thoughts quickly drew away from those happy ideas, though, and when she recalled one specific type of organic creatures, she started to think about her own kind once again.

Those creatures were really little. Exceptionally small. Microscopic. It took the gem biologists a lot of time to figure out that they existed and they only found out because the little beings were killing bigger animals. It turned out that they were consuming the flesh of the bigger creatures and creating more of their kind out of it.

The similarity between gems and those microscopic organic beings was both uncanny and uncomfortable. Finding new planets, colonizing them and using every last piece of resources to make more soldiers and ships that would later be used to destroy other worlds. It was an unending cycle of destruction, fueled by the Diamonds' greed and gems' way of reproduction.

Agate looked down from the bridge's ceiling and checked out the outside view. The ship was flying towards a fairly big star to use its gravity field to slingshot itself further away. The vessel was travelling at unbelievable speed, using stars and planets to accelerate. This allowed the ship to save energy and maximize the ship engine's efficiency.

The orange gem picked up the peridot-made figurine and examined it up close. She still had no idea what its purpose was but she started to recognise what was it suppose to represent - a really beefy peridot. It looked as if a peridot shapeshifted into a jasper; giant chest, muscular arms and legs, an unwieldy blade and a head with a piece of transparent green plastic representing a visor. Agate chuckled and held the figurine in front of her face.

\- "Seventy-eight years left..." - she sighed - "I'm going to go insane..."

* * *

The flashy and colourful display outside of the ship was equally enchanting and terrifying. The distant stars faded and were curtained by the gas clouds coming from the nebula. It sometimes pulled the vessel into small gravitational wells and constantly messed with its systems. It kinda felt like flying through a giant sandstorm made from hundreds of different colours of sand and dust.

Agate didn't move from the bridge since her ship flew into the nebula. She desperately tried to control the situation while watching the space on the other side of the vessel's walls with her eyes wide opened.

The orange gem never heard about such wonders. She didn't learn about space or space travel so she wasn't prepared at all. She was quite fascinated with every new thing, though, and couldn't wait to uncover other mysteries of the cosmos.

A buzz from the ship's computer interrupted her train of thought. She opened up the situation report and quickly read through. The vessel's systems picked up some weird anomalies. Time anomalies to be precise.

It didn't mean anything to Agate and that in itself was kind of frightening. "Time anomaly" could mean anything. It could be some mildly irritating unpleasantness but at the same time, it could be a complete annihilation.

Because of that, she wanted to get out of this place as fast as possible. She reached for the holo screen of the main computer but before her fingers could touch it the vessel shook violently and another notification popped up.

The main engines were dead as far as Agate could tell. She couldn't get any readings which was a good and bad thing. No readings meant they weren't working at the moment but it didn't mean they wouldn't work at all in the near future. There still was hope. The safety mode engaged and additional thrusters automatically turned on. The ship decelerated until it was almost at a complete standstill.

Agate stood up and briskly made her way towards the engine room. She was halfway there before skidding to a halt. She remembered that she left the holo-tablet on the bridge. Turning around, she went back up to the bridge before freezing in place. Her eyes opened wide and she couldn't help but stare - someone was sitting on the main pilot's seat. They were holding the peridot figurine in their orange hands.

The orange gem cautiously closed in and looked at the gem who was occupying her seat. They had yellowish, nearly golden hair combed into a braid and an orange uniform with Yellow Diamond's insignia on the chest. An oval shaped agate was attached to the outside of her hand.

She was looking at a time clone of herself.

\- "Umm..." - she tried to make the second Fire Agate notice her - "Would you help me with the repairs?" - she asked.

\- "Nah" - the time clone answered briefly. She didn't even look at the other gem and sounded pretty bored.

Agate was a bit confused but she didn't bother asking any more questions before grabbing her tablet. Gripping it in her hand, Agate quickly left the room. She went straight towards the engine room, wondering about the nature of this strange time anomaly. Will she find more time clones? Could she really trust them with anything? 'They are me so it should be okay, right?' she asked herself.

\- "Hey, are you going to the engine room?" - asked a familiar voice. Just around the corner there was standing another time clone.

\- "Yes?" - she answered hesitantly. It shouldn't have been weird but it was, and Agate still felt unsure if she could really trust these anomalies. They were her, but they weren't. And frankly, talking with them didn't help at all. They creeped her out.

\- "You don't need to. There's nothing to repair down there" - the clone said. It sounded casual but at the same time kind of forced.

\- "What do you mean?" - Agate was a bit more confused than before.

\- "Everything is okay. We don't need to repair anything" - the anomaly tried to sound calm but there was something in her voice suggesting that she was afraid for some reason.

\- "How can everything be okay if the ship isn't moving?" - the orange gem was losing her patience. She couldn't believe that she, Fire Agate, could try to stop her, herself, from travelling. It didn't make a lot of sense - "Are you doing this because you don't want to disappear?" - she asked without really thinking.

\- "Wha..." - the clone was now not only nervous but also confused - "No! It doesn't work like that!"

They both fell silent when another anomaly walked past them. She had a small bruise on her cheek, completely ignored the existence of the arguing Agates and headed straight towards the bridge.

\- "Get out of my way" - the orange gem coldly spoke.

Not waiting for the clone's answer, she took a few long steps towards the engine room. She didn't get far, though. The anomaly she just ended the conversation with ran past her and blocked her way with her arms.

\- "You seriously don't need to go there. It will change nothing" - she said quickly.

\- "If it really doesn't matter, why are you trying to stop me?" - Agate snarled. At this point, her patience was pretty much non-existent - "I'm saying this for the last time: get out of my way or I'll make you" - she said when the clone didn't answer her question after a few moments. Agate winded back and struck the clone, hard.

The anomaly didn't move from her place. She didn't look surprised at all by the punch. It was like she knew what Agate would do all along. And soon after punching her in the face and walking past her, the orange gem started to understand her.

Or more like... understand the nature of this anomaly.

That time clone went through all of this already. She talked, she argued and she punched. And soon she was on the receiving side of the punch. Agate herself would soon be in this situation too.

Even more confused than before, she walked into the engine room and started checking everything that could be in need of repairs. After a quite a long time it turned out that everything was working exactly how it should. The engines only needed to cool down and after that, the ship would fly as good as it flew before.

It was probably the first time she felt that stupid.

She walked out of the room and after few units, she could already hear footsteps on the metal floor. She panicked a little, not knowing what to do. She didn't want to get slapped in the face by her own time clone. On the other hand, she started to realise that if she was to do something differently than before, she would change both her future and her past. That would make completely no sense and probably create a paradox of some kind.

And because of that, just to be safe, Agate went with what she remembered.

\- "Hey, are you going to the engine room?" - she stopped and asked the time clone that just walked out from around the corner.

\- "Yes?" - she looked kinda creeped out.

\- "You don't need to. There's nothing to repair down there" - the orange gem said. She really wanted to at least form the sentence a bit differently but she was scared that she would only make it worse. As a result, her words seemed a bit forced.

\- "What do you mean?" - the anomaly was visibly confused.

\- "Everything is okay. We don't need to repair anything" - she answered getting ready for the punch. 'So that's why she looked afraid,' she thought.

\- "How can everything be okay if the ship isn't moving?" - the time clone was getting pretty worked up. The lack of patience was clearly visible - Are you doing this because you don't want to disappear?

The orange gem knew that this line wasn't thought out at all but her own ignorance nearly made her cringe. She wanted to explain everything but she knew that she couldn't do it safely. After all, she didn't want to damage her own timeline.

\- "Wha..." - she tried to sound as confused as possible and to hide her irritation - "No! It doesn't work like that!"

She suddenly heard footsteps from behind. Both she and her interlocutor fell silent. Agate nearly forgot about this anomaly. She wondered from where on the timeline she was. The bruise on her cheek was implying that her existence happened pretty soon.

\- "Get out of my way" - the time clone said when the bruised one disappeared in the corridor leading towards the bridge. Her voice was cold and actually scared the orange gem a bit. Being on the receiving side of this cold, imperative behaviour for the first time in thousands of years was really weird and uncomfortable.

After that, the time clone went straight towards the engine room. She was taking long steps but Agate managed to catch up with her.

The orange gem gulped. She knew what was coming but she still stepped in front of the anomaly, blocking her way.

\- "You seriously don't need to go there. It will change nothing" - she said quickly.

\- "If it really doesn't matter, why are you trying to stop me?" - the anomaly snarled. She was really, really angry. Agate was instantly reminded of some traumatic experiences from the past. Agates were scary - "I'm saying this for the last time: get out of my way or I'll make you" - the time clone said when she didn't get any answer.

The orange gem didn't move from her place. She just stood motionlessly and took a punch to the face, her expression unchanged. It wasn't really painful but it sure left a mark on her cheek.

She sighed deeply. She couldn't help but feel kinda bad about herself. About what she did before. About her anger. Back then, she acted like an agate. Like a true agate.

Yellow Diamond would be really proud of her.

Deep in thoughts, the orange gem walked through the corridor, completely ignoring the pair of arguing time clones. She went straight to the bridge

The main pilot's seat wasn't occupied this time so she sat down. For a moment she was just staring at one of the screens but she quickly got bored, picked up the peridot-made figurine and started to examine it closely. She didn't react when she heard footsteps behind her seat.

\- "Umm..." - a familiar voice called out - "Would you help me with the repairs?"

\- "Nah..." - she answered. And then she just waited. First for the time clone to leave, then for the ship's engines to cool down. It didn't take much time.

Soon she could finally continue her journey.

* * *

'Where did we come from?' Agate asked herself for the tenth time. This question bugged her for some time despite technically knowing the answer.

Gems came from the Homeworld. The capital planet in the main system of their empire. It was a beautiful, perfect world, the pinnacle of gems' civilization's technology. A place that Agate had never seen in her life.

Gems also came from the ground. They came from small spores planted into stone. The spores collected minerals and lumped them into a gemstone. Agate, like every other gem, started like that. The kindergartens, the place of a gem's production, weren't unfamiliar to her either.

But her question wasn't really about that. She wondered about her species' past. It was the history that wasn't written anywhere. It was the history that the diamonds either erased or kept to themselves.

Because nobody really knew where gems came from.

They weren't organic beings so they couldn't have come from smaller organisms that slowly changed to be more and more adapted to their surroundings. A scientist gem that once visited Agate's home-colony called this process "evolution". She was also over three hundred years too late to research any organic creatures.

Gems' reproduction process required technology and knowledge to be possible and reliable. The orange gem couldn't imagine a functioning gemstone being created by someone unspecialized and without a proper equipment.

That meant that there needed to be someone or something to create the first gems. Someone created diamonds. Someone projected the right spore and planted it into the right type of stone.

It was possible that gems' creators were a civilisation of highly advanced organic beings. They may have created the gems as robots - fully sentient deadly machines able to replicate themselves using resources that were easily obtainable on the most of the solid planets.

Judging by the absence of the gem species' creators, something went... wrong. Most likely the diamonds didn't like being someone's underlings and decided to eradicate their masters. After that, they conquered the destroyed civilization's territory and started to build their own empire.

This theory scared Agate. It meant that all this violence, all this destruction caused by the Diamond Authority conquering more and more planets resulted from a mistake. A mistake made by scientists from some sort of an ancient civilisation.

It also meant that gems were only robots; complicated, unbelievably high-tech, sentient machines. But still just machines. Little gemstone-shaped computers that were able to create bodies made of solid light and conquer a pretty big chunk of the galaxy.

\- "Another existential crisis..." - she muttered to herself while looking at countless glowing spots in the black void of space - "I may just fly into a star... It would be easier."

* * *

According to the ship's computer, something was wrong. Again. The vessel entered another anomalous area.

Being bored out of her mind and unhealthily curious, Agate turned off the main engines and soon the ship slowed down enough for the close celestial bodies to be visible.

It appeared that the orange gem's ship ended up in some kind of asteroid field. Huge chunks of unidentified matter were floating around without any logical pattern.

Everything seemed fairly normal. At least for a few moments. Agate soon noticed that all those asteroids were flying freely in the space. There was nothing around that could hold all of this in its gravitational field.

It was quite unusual for an asteroid field to just hang in the middle of nothingness.

A bit confused and even more curious, the orange gem decided to investigate. She turned on the external lights and slowly rotated the ship around.

It turned out that the asteroids weren't really asteroids. At least the giant derelict in front of her vessel wasn't. It was far, far bigger than Agate's ship, dark-grey coloured, angular and pretty wrecked.

The orange gem's ship started to slowly fly along the side of the wreck, looking at it as closely as possible. Soon it turned out that the derelict got nearly ripped in half. There was a giant breach in the side that was exposing some overly complicated structures.

Right next to the hole there was a series of white symbols. Agate didn't have a clue what they could mean. She've never seen this language in her life.

For some time she considered checking out the insides of the wreckage but suddenly something caught her attention. A small piece of something really familiar on the edge of the space that was lit up by her ship's lights.

She turned her vessel in that direction and gasped in shock. It was a gem ship. A bit bigger one than the one she was in right now but still familiar. She've seen one that looked exactly like that back when the colony was still populated and active.

\- "And what in Diamond's name are you doing here?" - Agate asked herself out loud and started to slowly fly towards the familiar looking wreck.

It was in a roughly similar shape to her ship and had few nasty looking holes in its body. It looked like if something has been ripped out from the inside of the wreck.

The orange gem's vessel pulled out its landing gear and attached itself to the side of the other ship. Agate turned the engines off and stood up from her seat. After picking up the jasper's sword, she went towards the ship's entrance and went through the decompressing procedure. After all, she didn't want to have anything in her ship ruined by the vacuum of the space.

When the procedure finally ended, she put on a special belt with a long cord attached to it and walked out of the ship. Using ladder-like pieces of metal that were sticking out of her ship's side, she walked down to the wreck and started to head towards the closest breach. She went inside without thinking about consequences.

After crawling through over a unit long hole, she ended up in one of the storage rooms. There was a lot of large storage boxes for minerals and supplies but most of them were empty. Agate was sure there must've been more cargo before it got sucked out through the breach.

It appeared that the ship's reactor was dead as there was no power. The lights were off and the control holo-screens didn't work which made opening doors a bit harder. The orange gem needed to use her gemstone's light and relatively new knowledge about starships to figure a way through.

After finding an emergency lever, she could easily open the storage room's door using only her strength. The corridor outside was in a fairly good shape; there was no debris flying around, no breaches and no wires or pipes sticking out of the walls.

Agate looked around and quickly found a few rooms. She ignored the crew's cabin and the engine room. At least for moment or two. She just didn't think that checking those places out was going to give her any answers.

The third room caught her interest, though. Mainly because it wasn't usual for this type of vessels to have a laboratory on their deck.

Once again, she used the emergency systems to open the door so she could go inside. One of the things she noticed in the lab were two breaches in the wall. They were slightly smaller than the one she used to get inside the ship but still big enough to suck out everything that wasn't nailed to the floor.

Because of that, most of the interesting things were gone. But there still was something that made coming here completely worth the risk.

It was a big glass cylinder filled with some kind of frozen liquid. Inside of it, hanging on a bunch of wires and tubes, was a really unnatural looking organic being. It had something that looked like a misshapen arm, a bunch of bulbous lower limbs, swollen body with an even more swollen neck and a face that seemed to be full of pain despite being completely alien. Yet the most unsettling thing about this creature was a bunch of colourful shards surgically attached to its partially exposed spine.

It was dead, frozen inside a glass cylinder in an abandoned ship. Thankfully.

But what was that? An experimental hybrid of a shattered gem and an organic creature? Who was so lacking in terms of empathy to do such a thing?

Agate stopped herself. She was thinking about her own kind after all. She perfectly knew the answer to the last question.

Significantly sadder and trying not to think too much, the orange gem went back to the corridor and started to move towards where the bridge should be.

And easily found it. The bridge was where it should be.

Well... What was left of it was there...

Most of the ceiling was gone. It looked like if something just grabbed the front of the ship and ripped it off. This included a good portion of the control systems. A chunk of the main computer was still floating right outside the vessel, attached to a few wires.

For a few moments, Agate wondered if it would be worth the effort to try to extract any data storing devices from the destroyed machine but after a closer look, she realised that everything that wasn't destroyed by whatever happened on the ship, got seriously damaged by low temperatures and radiation.

She sighed without actually sighing due to lack of air and backed out of the wrecked bridge. After checking out those more interesting locations, she still had one, very important question: what happened to the crew?

There were no shards left which meant that they probably got sucked out into space. Yet it seemed kind of weird that not a single crew member was able to survive.

The orange gem went to the two remaining rooms to check them out. The engine room was in a surprisingly good condition outside of the melted fuel cells that pretty much destroyed the reactor beyond repair. Compared to that, the crew's cabin was in ruin. Most of the walls were completely missing, furniture was wrecked and even the floor sustained some damage.

After that, Agate didn't have a lot left to do in the wreckage. She was a bit angry at herself for wasting time and a bit more at the abandoned ship for existing and not giving any clues. Everything inside was strangely out of place. The lack of any traces of the crew and the weird experiment of a creature in the lab were disturbing enough on their own but the unexplained nature of the damage to the hull and existence of the giant derelict right next to the gem ship was downright scary.

Back in the ship, after getting through the decompression process, the orange gem started to feel a bit weird. She was walking close to the walls of the vessel's corridors but it wasn't because she felt weak. Something was pulling her towards them. It wasn't strong, but it was there.

When she managed to reach the bridge, the pull was disturbing pretty much everything she was doing and making her unhealthy worried. She hurried to the pilot's seat and turned off the electromagnets on the landing gear. The vessel was now floating on its own, ready to continue the journey.

Feeling every photon of her body and every atom of her gemstone being pulled towards the nearest wall, Agate clenched her teeth and turned on the engines. The giant derelict of unknown origin quickly disappeared from her field of view. So did the gem ship and thousands of other wrecks that the "asteroid field" was made of.

With them, the weird force disappeared too, making Agate nearly fall off her seat.

She didn't really think much about it, though. Her mind was busy with suppressing any traces of curiosity that this escapade left.

* * *

**Oh boy... That took some time. Not really because of DM'ing but rather because of me doing a lot of different things. Not much time, not much motivation. And because it took me so long, this chapter feels kinda crappy. How do you like it?**

**As per usual - I want to thank  Mellium (or G. M. Keys , she changed her username) for beta-reading.**

**Next chapter will probably be the last. I don't really have any more ideas for this story and I'm pretty tired of the space adventures.  
And the last thing: while writing the fragment with the time anomaly I was inspired by a story by a famous Polish writer and futurologist Stanisław Lem.**

**~MS**


	7. Settled

7\. Settled

A sudden shift on the ship's main monitor startled Agate a bit. The image turned from a blur of thousands of stars into a focused view of a planet. A small, blue dot, partially illuminated by the nearest star.

The orange gem quickly understood what it all meant - she reached her destination. Without a moment of hesitation, she ordered the computer to perform a scan. It was a first time she was scanning a planet and she was really excited to see the results.

They were quite fascinating.

For starters, the little blue planet was brimming with organic life. Millions of different kinds of creatures were living in nearly every corner of this world. There was also a rather weak energy signature of unidentified source. Most likely signs of activity of a primitive civilization.

The scanner also found some signs of gem lives and structures. They were weak and old, though. And there wasn't a lot of them. Not enough to be a properly functioning colony. This meant that the information from her planet's moon base was true - Homeworld abandoned this world.

Looking through a wall of text that was still appearing next to the image of the blue planet, Agate noticed something that could help her in deciding what to do next. This little useful bit of data was about a natural satellite that was orbiting her plausible future home. Or rather about what was standing on this moon's grey surface - a Diamond's moon base. It was still active and was sending a standard short-range identification signal out into the cosmos.

After thinking about the pros and cons of such unplanned escapade, the orange gem decided that it was worth her time. She hoped that she could find more information about the rebellion and war that took place on the blue planet. She was particularly interested in rebellion's leaders who might still live down there and in the details of the war's end. There was also a chance that in the moon's database she would find some maps with gem structures that might be used as a safe landing area and temporary shelter.

She switched her ship's autopilot's destination to the moon and started staring at the timer showing the time till arrival. It wasn't that short but compared to the time she already spend travelling it felt like a few short moments. She felt like if she blinked, she would miss the entire flight.

And she probably took a small, accidental nap, because when she opened her eyes, the ship was already slowing down and preparing for touch-down. She was a bit startled by the situation. It wasn't normal for a gem to take an accidental nap. It could even mean that her defects didn't only affect her mental programming but also her gemstone's energy production. Hoping that she won't end up losing every last unit of energy one day and just disappearing, she finally looked at the unfamiliar surface of the unfamiliar moon.

The views were pretty boring. Every single square unit of the moon's surface was covered with grey sand or rocks. The natural satellite was shaped by thousands of impact craters and because of that, there were no truly interesting geological features. And finally - there was no atmosphere. No clouds, no colour in the sky - only black void with small blinking lights of distant stars and blue orb of a planet that she could cover with her fist.

The only object that was really standing out in this sterile environment was the Diamond's moon base - a giant silver tower with a wide base and a glass dome on the very top. Agate's vessel landed gently on a landing pad placed near the entrance that - to the gem's disbelief - was wide open. She quickly grabbed her sword and went outside, trying not to lose too much time in the decompression process.

It soon turned out that she didn't need to be anxious. The inside of the tower was as sterile as the entire moon and the only things that were out of place were the opened gate and the stairs that weren't hidden like they should. That definitely meant that whoever was there last time forgot to clean up after themselves. Maybe they were in a hurry?

A lot calmer now, Agate started to look around. Using her gemstone as a light source, she got a close look at four frescos that were portraying the four Diamonds. She've seen them before but this was over seventy years ago. Besides those ones were in a perfect condition - untouched by elements or wild creatures, with colours as bright as the colours of the Diamonds themselves and outlines as sharp as their minds.

The orange gem smashed her head on the nearest wall and took a moment to collect herself. She shouldn't have studied those pretty pictures so closely. It was hard enough to get rid of Homeworld's influence as an agate for the first time - the second one could be even harder.

Not wanting to waste any more time, she headed upstairs, her steps quick and quite long. She even tried to skip some treads but she gave up on that pretty quickly since it required jumping.

She arrived at the top floor after a few long moments and nearly ignoring the middle one that had only a weird orb in the centre of it. Besides the breathtaking view of the moon's grey, crater-riddled surface and the distant blue planet there was also a big computer build into an equally big desk with a big armchair standing right next to it. Surprisingly they weren't diamond-sized. Perhaps some other kinds of gems were managing this outpost. Maybe an agate? Who knows...

Agate definitely didn't but imagining herself sitting in that kind of chair and overseeing an entire colony was pretty interesting. Not very pleasant nor all that unfamiliar but still interesting. It was mostly about the view.

She sat down and turned on the computer. A big part of this amazing view got instantly covered by an enormous holographic image of a finished colony. There were holes drilled through the planet's core, giant spires and other supersized buildings. It was a pretty disturbing model; Agate felt really bad looking at it with the real planet in the background.

But she didn't come here to feel bad about her race. Pushing all the ugly thoughts out of her head, she closed the simulation and started to look through the files. It took her a bit longer than usual - the user interface was a lot different than the one she was used to. Soon it turned out that most of the data were encrypted but she managed to find a handful of interesting information.

First of all, there was an entire collection of rebellion members' profiles. A sapphire, a pearl, a bismuth, a ruby and hundreds of others. And finally, on the very top of the list, Rose Quartz herself. A big, buff pink gem with a mass of pink hair and a white dress. Homeworld wanted her gemstone in one piece, probably to torture her with unending interrogations and then shatter or use in some cruel way.

The orange gem also found some maps. They weren't important enough to be secured properly but they still showed coordinates of some places of interests and - more importantly - warp pads. She quickly downloaded them onto her holo-tablet that she somehow didn't forget to take when she left the ship.

The last thing on the base's main computer that was available without any kind of a password was an order to every Homeworld gem on the planet. It was an order to evacuate immediately. Every single gem that stayed on the surface was to face consequences. They didn't specify what consequences, though.

With a few new answers and - thankfully - not a lot of new questions, Agate went back to the vessel. She transferred the data she took from the base into the ship's systems and started to think about where to go. After a while, she decided that it would be wise to land in one of two desolate kindergartens. She chose the second one and turned on the engines.

The ship took off with a loud wheeze. The engines were clearly having problems but they managed to carry the vessel out of the moon's weak gravitational pull so Agate didn't bother to even check what was wrong. She had her prize right in front of her and wasn't going to slow down when she was so close.

But after a few hours of looking at the slowly growing planet, when her ship finally entered its atmosphere, she understood her mistake. Whatever happened to the engines happened because they worked pretty much continuously for over seventy years. The orange gem didn't replace any part during the entire journey. It wasn't surprising that something started to suddenly fall apart.

Agate first noticed the problem when the vessel didn't start to slow down after entering the atmosphere. For some reason, the front engines didn't turn on. Most likely there was something wrong with the power source or the wiring. Everything would be alright in any other situation - the orange gem could just find the source of the problem, repair it and continue her journey - but now she was falling towards a desert and her ship was gaining speed. She didn't have time for any complicated actions.

Panicking a bit, she quickly looked through all the different alerts that were popping up on the holoscreen and tried to manually turn on the engines. It didn't change anything, though, so she just collected everything she took with herself - the jasper's sword, the figurine, the peridot gemstone and her holo tablet - and quickly put it all into a bubble. Then she curled up in the pilot's seat and formed an energy shield in front of herself, bracing for impact.

For a few uncomfortably long seconds everything seemed silent and calm. Then, hundreds of different alarms started to howl as the ship was literally falling apart mid-flight. After that, there was only an incredibly loud, crashing sound and overwhelming darkness.

* * *

It was just laying there. Right in the middle of the table. A small, oblong thing with a few buttons, capable of creating a holographic image that could be interacted with. It also stored tons of really interesting data that could potentially hold answers to a lot of questions.

Little boy with black, curly hair couldn't take his eyes off of it. He perfectly knew that he shouldn't touch it. It would be extremely rude to do that and he didn't want to be rude towards anybody. Especially to his friends.

But he couldn't just turn off his curiosity. It was there and it was torturing him with new questions and theories. It was harder and harder for him to keep his hands to himself.

Ultimately, thanks to the fact that there was nobody who could stop him, the boy scooped up the tablet and climbed up to his room where he hid under the quilt of his bed. Then he turned on the device, mimicking the way she was using it and started to look through countless different files. They all were named in a gem language which made the searching a little bit tougher - thanks to one of his guardians, the boy knew the language but just a little.

\- "Au-dio-log" - he deciphered a slightly familiar word - "That's should be it..." - he said to himself quietly and lightly tapped the file's icon with his index finger.

\- "Ekhem, ekhem... So... umm..." - a familiar voice could be heard from the tablet's little speaker - "Fire Agate here. Discovering Earth audio log, part one. Maybe I should find a different name for that. And think a bit more about what to say. Because right now my mind is kind of blank.

I should probably just start by talking about this planet. And... Oh, stars... This planet is something. The sky is blue, there is tons of water and so much life. It's kind of overwhelming, really. Pretty much everything is alive. From those usually unmoving plants to humans who look surprisingly similar to us, gems. And by similar, I mean that they have two arms and two legs. And one head. I thought, that alien species would differ a bit more from us.

I also didn't expect their technology to be that advanced. I mean... they aren't exactly capable of getting out of their star system and they don't have really advanced computers but they aren't some primitives who just bang sticks and stones together all day.

I must say that I admire them. Not because of their technology but because their society allowed them to be individuals. To be free to decide what they want to do with their lives. Earth is a place full of freedom and possibilities. Well... at least that's what Steven told me.

I should probably talk about Steven for a bit. He's a half-human, half-gem kid and I still don't understand how it is possible, even after someone explained to me how human's reproducing cycle works.

But I can't say that he's not a nice person. He talks a lot, is really curious and cares about pretty much every single living creature he can find. I don't think I would be able to understand all these new things that fast without him. Although the gems helped out too.

Oh! Right, the gems. They are what's left from this rebellion that brought me there in the first place. They call themselves the Crystal Gems and they're pretty nice too, though they were really nervous when they saw me for the first time.

Well... most of them... There was one that acted as calm as ever. She's named Garnet and she's a fusion of a sapphire and a ruby. I don't know how that happened but they both look and work pretty well together. And they are really strong, even for a gem. I would even say that Garnet is probably capable of fighting a well-made quartz warrior as an equal.

Other than her, there is Pearl and Amethyst. The first one is quite odd for a pearl. She's a renegade, a free gem who has no master and can fight like the finest swordmaster. Yet there is still a lot of pearl in her. She really cares about appearance and likes to clean everything. I'm pretty sure she would've lost her mind if she were to see my old home..." - Agate's recorded voice laughed a little. It was a sad laugh. The boy decided to talk about that with her later. About her old planet - "About the second one, the Amethyst, I would say that she is Pearl's polar opposite. She's a bit overcooked and smaller than a quartz should be but that doesn't stop her from enjoying life and being really energetic. She is messy, playful and can be a bit obnoxious sometimes. My subordinate seems to be a little scared of her for some reason. I should probably look into it..." - there was a short pause in the recording - "I nearly forgot about other gems! They arrived on Earth a bit later from what I've understood. The first of them, Peridot, was pretty scared of me at first. She was afraid that I was a Homeworld's enforcer that has come for her. Thankfully, I was able to clear all misunderstandings and to have a pretty nostalgic moment with her. She may not be a familiar gem, she may not even look like peridots that I'm used to but talking with her was like remembering the best days of my old home.

This peridot lives in a building that is referred to as a barn. It's mainly constructed out of organic matter called wood but she rebuilt it to match her beauty standards. I would say that it looks a bit odd if I were to be completely honest.

Yet she really seems to enjoy all this weirdness. And the same might be said about her... um... roommate as Steven put it. Her roommate is a lapis lazuli. It was the first time I've ever seen that kind of a gem. I mean... I heard about them but since my home planet was pretty dry, a gem that is used to move around masses of water isn't really useful. So... Thoughts? She's pretty. And quite sad. Though, I'm pretty sure that spending time with the small peridot is helping her a lot.

Yeah... That was the first audio log from Earth. I think I might make some more of them..." - the recording stopped completely. Without the voice, the boy sitting under the quilt started to feel the lack of air.

He lifted the heavy fabric and crawled out with the tablet in his hand. He looked around his home in search of the gems but it seemed that they all were out, occupied with their own business. The boy, now knowing that nobody will interrupt him for at least a moment, focused his attention back on the piece of gem technology that he was holding in his hands. Once again, with his index finger, he tapped an icon on the tablet's holo-screen.

\- "Fire Agate, the Earth discovering audio log, entry number two" - the orange gem's voice was a bit calmer this time - "Today, as in the day I'm recording this entry, marks the second week since I arrived on Earth. I must say that I've learned a lot since then. Mostly about humans, and the planet's ecosystem. I've also visited some gem's ruins that were built before the rebellion started and got some history lessons from Pearl. She does a pretty good job at remembering all this stuff. She is also really passionate about Rose Quartz. And I mean really passionate. From what she says and how she acts it's pretty clear that she was in love with her.

We also visited the beta kindergarten. It was the one I've crashed my ship into. And speaking of the ship... Peridot managed to salvage most of it already. She'll probably build some kind of robot out of all this scrap. I don't mind her taking it at all. Although, now, thanks to the fact that most of the vessel was not here anymore, I could see just how much damage my crash-landing made. There is an actual crater now!

Pearl said that I shouldn't feel bad about making a mess in a kindergarten. It was kind of messy in the first place, after all.

But spending time out there and looking at those few last bent pieces of metal lying on the sand made me remember the crash. I was thinking about it since then because it was a pretty important event for me. I don't even know why. It doesn't seem like something that would be that important...

So... Today I thought that maybe talking about the crash, even to no one other than this piece of technology, might be a good idea. Maybe it will stop me from thinking about it all the time, who knows? Thankfully, I'm not alone with the holo-tablet. My subordinate is accompanying me and I'm pretty sure that she will talk to me about that afterwards" - she said happily - "Ekhem... Well... The ship's systems started failing soon after I entered the atmosphere. I'm pretty sure there was something wrong between the reactor and the maneuvering engines. Anyway, I couldn't slow down no matter what I was doing and there was no time to even think about fixing anything.

Seeing that this fight is pretty much lost, I quickly gathered everything that was important to me, put it all into a bubble and started to create a barrier around myself. Making my shield bigger than my torso is a quite time-consuming process, though, and judging by the metal part that nearly pierced my lower back, I didn't manage to close it completely before the ship crashed.

And oh stars... Never before in my life, I went through something like that. First, there were only the sounds of the ship slowly falling apart and the view of Earth's surface that was getting closer and closer with every second. Then, a moment before the crash, I've just closed my eyes and clenched my teeth, scared of being shattered after getting so close to the end of my journey.

The crash itself was... a lot less intense that I've thought it would be. Outside that one piece of metal that nearly stabbed me, everything was pretty calm in my little energy sphere. The entire time I was just hugging the bubble and listening to the sounds of metal being forcefully bent. I think there was an explosion later on? There's no way that the reactor would be able to survive that amount of damage and neglect. Also, I've seen a big hole in the back of the vessel later on and I'm pretty sure that wasn't the result of my actions.

I'm exactly sure what happened next. I mean... I opened my eyes and found myself inside of the ruined bridge but I was pretty confused. I didn't know how much time I've spent in the wreckage. Also, my shield was literally pulsing with energy. I've never collected that much. The effects of releasing it were amazing. I've managed to pretty much disintegrate the front of the ship and a huge pile of dirt that was laying on top of it. Thanks to that, I could just walk out of the wreckage. No crawling inside the ship-sandwich, no digging, nothing. I just stood up and walked out.

That's when I've seen the Earth for the first time. The white clouds in the blue sky... Rest wasn't that great. It was a kindergarten after all. Lots of sand, rocks and old gem scrap. Equally familiar and boring. I did spend a night there, though. In one of the holes. It felt really weird but I needed some rest.

I wanted to make some plans in the morning. But before I could properly wake up, someone found me. It was Steven and Garnet. They interrogated me and took me to their base. After that everything went pretty smoothly..." - she went quiet for a moment - "What? No, I'm just wondering if I have anything more to talk about. I suppose that's a good idea. But it will take too long... I think I'll end this one here" - the recording ended abruptly.

As if waiting for a moment of silence, the boy's stomach rumbled quite loudly. He realised that it was late past the time he usually ate his evening snack. Not wanting to continue hungry, he jumped off of the bed and walked down to the kitchen. He took some bread and opened the fridge to find some more ingredients. After a few minutes, a sandwich was ready to be eaten. It soon disappeared into the boy's mouth.

With his stomach full, the boy went right back to his bed and once again picked the holo-tablet up. There was only one file with "audiolog" in its name left. He tapped it with his finger and started listening.

\- "Earth discovering log, entry number three" - started the Fire Agate's voice. It didn't continue right away, though, because a loud noise interrupted her words - "Are you okay?" - there was a muffled "yeah" in the background - "Do you need any help out there? You sure? Okay, call me if you do. Umm... I'm kinda lost right now... Forgot what I was going to say... Oh! I know! Let's start with this" - she cleared her throat - "Today the rebels showed me something... special. I don't know how else to describe that. It was a room hidden inside of their base. There were some lava and a lot of pipes in it but that's not really important. What is important, though, are all those bubbles that were floating near the ceiling. Differently coloured, they all had a gem inside. At first, I thought that it was a kind of a graveyard, similar to the one I created back in the colony, but then Garnet said that those gems were corrupted. Stripped of their memories, form and personality. Changed into monsters. Rebels are keeping them safe until they will find some sort of a cure.

It's pretty creepy, this room. The sheer thought of having hundreds of crazy, misshapen gems in your base is really uncomfortable. If they all are like the monster I and Peridot saw in this Diamond forsaken kindergarten... I just hope those bubbles are really tough.

The rebels also showed me other rooms in their base. Like Amethyst's dump and Pearl's... um... Water room? I guess? There is a lot of water in it. She doesn't swim there, though, she mostly walks on all those watery platforms.

Steven also has a room, or so I was told. For some reason, he couldn't open the door. Apparently, it's not unusual. Both his powers and this room that Rose Quartz had left for him sometimes fail to obey him.

But all of that isn't really something I've wanted to talk about in this log. I wanted to talk about something that happened pretty much right after my arrival. Like a day after the crash landing. And... well... It was probably the most important thing that happened in my life since I've left the colony.

I probably mentioned that I've taken some things with me when I've started my journey towards the Earth. There was my holo-tablet, a sword, an old figurine and a gemstone. A Peridot gemstone. She was my closest subordinate.

Since I've become the colony's commander, she was living in the colony' command centre with me. She had only one responsibility - to keep the base operating. And she was quite good at that. Her ability to quickly fix all kinds of gem technology was irreplaceable.

We didn't talk a lot at first. I had my things to do and she had some on her own. But after few hundred years, when we were the only living inhabitants of the command centre, we started to spend more and more time with each other. It's nothing unusual. When you spend all your time in a building with another person, you are practically bound to start a conversation at some point. At least that's my opinion. I'm pretty sure that a lot of gems would disagree.

Unfortunately, that Diamond forsaken planet didn't let me have a friend who would make my existence bearable. Peridot was as defective as the rest of us, despite how normally she looked and acted. Her gemstone wasn't able to consistently create energy and one day she just run out of it.

I was shocked when I found her but I quickly calmed myself. I've put her into a special machine that made the process of reforming faster and easier and then just waited. I was checking on her at least once a day and I was getting sadder with every visit. At some point, I just stopped visiting the infirmary. I tried to forget but it only made my life emptier.

I suppose that I've never lost hope completely. I wouldn't have taken her with me if I did.

And imagine how much this hope grow when Steven said that they have a way of healing gems. I immediately asked him to show me how. He agreed without even thinking and took me to some new place. It was definitely a gem-made structure, but it wasn't built by Homeworld. There was a lot of roses, both real ones and sculptures, and a statue of Rose Quartz that was standing on top of a fountain. Two streams of clear water were flowing from her eyes.

Steven said that this water was special. Those were his mother's tears. And apparently, a Rose Quartz's tears were able to heal every injury on both organic and non-organic life forms. He said that I just need to take the gem, put it into the fountain and hope for the best.

And so I did.

I honestly didn't know what to think about it. It seemed like... like some kind of magical ritual. I've never seen it working.

But I waited anyway. The hope was still there...

When the entire fountain started to glow with this green light, I nearly fell on my butt. A radiant gem-shaped construct started to rise from the water and a few moment later she was there.

Peridot. My Peridot. She's as tall as your average era one Peridot and she still has her hair quite short and combed to the left. Although this time she added a short braid on the back of her head. She is also still in the yellow diamond's standard peridot uniform and still has this little magnifying glass over her right eye - Fire Agate chuckled lightly to herself - But back to the story! When Peridot reformed she was pretty freaked out. She started to look around, found the Rose Quartz statue, screamed in terror and fell into the water. It was this moment when I realised what actually happened and closed my mouth.

I can't even express how happy I was to see her. I started laughing, run up to her and just hugged her like I never hugged anyone. Then, with Steven's help, I started to explain what is going on. It took us quite a long time. I think that the sun started to set when we finished talking and went back to the rebel base.

On the way, we discussed the naming problem that appeared with a second peridot but it quickly got solved. My Peridot just decided that she will be referred to as "Vix". It was apparently a nickname that she got from her full name during a game with other peridots. They had the same problem and calling each other by their cuts was too tedious.

I must say that her meeting with rebels went better than I..."

\- "Steven" - a soft voice with a characteristic accent suddenly sounded throughout the boy's bedroom. He quickly turned the holo-tablet off.

\- "Garnet?" - he asked with an unnaturally calm voice while trying to hide the device under his pillow - "Wha... What brings you here?"

\- "Oh, I'm pretty sure you know" - answered the fusion with a small smile on her face.

\- "Yeah... I shouldn't touch other people's things without their permission..." - he sighed and put the tablet in the middle of his bed - 'I was just so curious..."

\- "I know, Steven" - laughed Garnet - "It's your bedtime already. Better go and take a shower."

The dark-haired boy nodded and jumped off of his bed. He took his pyjamas from under the quill and went straight to the bathroom.

The fusion smiled lightly as she looked at the child. Then she picked up the holo-tablet and put it back where it was originally left by its rightful owner.

* * *

A thick tome landed on the grass with a quiet thump. It was written in this weird human alphabet and full of stars. Agate looked at it once again, not really knowing what to think about this archaic data storing device. It was fragile and inefficient but a lot of humans really loved it. She even asked Steven about that - he said that it's probably about the scent, holding something in your hands and turning the pages. She didn't really understand his answer. But this wasn't a first human tradition she couldn't yet understand.

The orange gem looked away from the book and finally sat down on the grass. She was only a few meters away from the edge of the cliff. There was a lighthouse behind her, the rebels' base below her and the bright sun in front of her. The Earth's star was slowly descending, hiding behind the horizon and dying everything in beautiful shades of orange, red and pink.

Soon the night will come and the sky will be dark enough to show everything that is hidden behind the Sun's glow during the day. Agate wanted to have a proper look at the Earth's night sky for some time now. She wanted to compare it to the sky she remembered from the colony.

\- "Hi" - the orange gem said after hearing quiet footsteps on the slightly overgrown grass - "Weren't you supposed to teach Peridot this game of yours?"

\- "How did you guess it was me?" - asked Vix sitting beside the bigger gem.

\- "I don't remember telling anyone but you what I'll be doing today" - she answered - "And I've never seen rebels climbing up here."

\- "It could've been Garnet" - the technician didn't want to surrender easily - "She would probably know where to find you... You know..."

\- "She would either be louder than you or completely silent" - she laughed - "So? Why are you here and not in the barn?"

\- "Peridot went somewhere with her companion... I couldn't find them in the barn's proximity."

\- "So you came here to hang out with me?" - she asked with a little smile.

\- "Yeah..." - the smaller gem scratched her neck. She sounded and looked a bit uncomfortable.

\- "I see that you are pretty okay with the new surroundings. You got used to Earth faster than I thought you would" - she picked up the book and looked at its cover. "Astronomy: Constellations and Asterisms" was the title - "Why are you so quiet then?"

\- "What? I'm not quiet" - the peridot seemed to be a little offended.

\- "Sure, we had some conversation since you reformed but..." - the orange gem signed - "I was the one talking for most of the time. And you seemed a little... troubled."

\- "I talked with others..." - Vix said. It was barely audible.

\- "But why not with me?"

For a few uncomfortably long minutes only the distant sound of the sea could be heard. Agate's fingers squeezed the book like if she wanted to check if it's real.

\- "Are we really the last ones?" - the green gem finally asked.

\- "Yeah..." - the ex-colony commander answered after a brief pause - "You know what was happening after they left us. Then, after I lost you... Well... Everything kept happening as it was before" - she opened the book and looked through the pictures and the text that was still pretty strange in her eyes - "You remember this peridot... The one with a ponytail on top of her head?" - she looked at her companion briefly - "She was the last one. When the planet got her, I decided that I couldn't stay there any longer."

\- "And the only gem you took was me..." - she said, her face turned away - "Why?"

Why?

Agate never actually thought about it. She just couldn't leave her there. She didn't ask herself any questions while taking the peridot's gemstone.

\- "I don't know..." - she answered - "Perhaps I still had hope" - she could feel Vix's eyes looking straight at her - "I hoped that I'll be able to see you again..."

After finishing her last sentence, Agate just sat there. She didn't say a word, she didn't move a muscle. She didn't even know what to expect from Vix right now.

To her surprise and relief, a weight of the smaller gem's head on her shoulder was the next thing she felt.

\- "So you really missed me" - the technician said - "That's a relief..."

* * *

**Afterword:**

**Well... That took a lot longer than I thought it would... When I was starting to write this story, I actually expected that I'll finish it in a month or two.** **That doesn't really matters, though. I finally finished it and now I can write about my inspirations and some things that I feel like could use explanations.**

**You should remember, my dear reader, that it all started with good old "stranded-away-from-home" trope. Like in "Robinson Crusoe" by Daniel Dafoe. Or in "The Martian" which was my inspiration to write this story. And I'm talking about the movie because I started to read the novel by Andy Weir only a few days before finishing this story. Of course, I kinda turned this trope around. The protagonist is stranded but not away from home. She needs to find a way to escape and it's not easy but she is still in the place she lived in for her entire life.**

**Another thing that inspired me was a story "The Seventh Voyage" from a book by polish author Stanisław Lem "The Star Diaries" ("Dzienniki gwiazdowe"). It was the chapter before this one where I've used this inspiration - time clones and misunderstandings. By the way - I really recommend Lem's books. I'm pretty sure that a lot of them, if not most, were translated into English.**

**There is actually another thing that happened in the sixth chapter and that I've wanted to write about - the derelict situation. First of all - the gem ship. There were a lot of holes in it and they all were shaped like if something was ripped out of the ship through its walls. And that's what actually happened - the entire crew got thrown out of the vessel through its walls. How? Who knows. There was also a second ship - a giant one with unknown writings on its side. Said writings wouldn't be unknown for us, though. It was a human ship - "USNF Ivanovich". It's from another time and another place. Also, its name is the last name of a general that was randomly generated in a game of Stellaris.**

**The last thing that I wanted to write about is the corrupted gem from the kindergarten. It wasn't corrupted by the same technology that corrupted nearly all the gems on Earth. This technology was older and a lot more destructive but at the same time more unstable. It wasn't guaranteed that this technology would corrupt a gem but if it did, it completely destroyed the gem's sanity and wiped its memory. That's why the corrupted gem from the colony's kindergarten was so misshapen.**

 

**Announcements:**

**First of all - there won't be any more chapters of this story. It's completed. There will not be any sequels either.**

**I'll soon post first chapters of my next story ("soon"). Look for "Into the woods we go" - a Steven Universe fanfiction set in a fantasy AU.**

 

**As per usual - big thanks to Mellium (G. M. Keys) for beta reading.**

**~MS**


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